


Homecoming

by Solea



Series: Homecomingverse [1]
Category: BBC Sherlock, Sherlock (TV), Sherlock - Fandom, Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Attraction, BAMF John, BAMF Mary, BAMF Sherlock, Bisexual Male Character, Bisexuality, Case Fic, Epic Bromance, Epic Friendship, Epic Love, Episode: s03e01 The Empty Hearse, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Smut, Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship/Love, Gen, Homosexuality, Humor, Love Triangles, Male Slash, Multi, Oral Sex, Other, POV Female Character, POV First Person, POV John Watson, POV Lestrade, POV Mary, POV Sherlock Holmes, Play Fighting, Polyamory, Requited Love, Slow Burn, Slow Romance, The Empty Hearse Spoilers, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-18
Updated: 2014-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-16 04:19:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 52
Words: 97,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1331668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Solea/pseuds/Solea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This started off as a cannon-divergent ficlet, and has turned into a longer work that continually riffs off canon, but with changes that I rather like.</p><p>So far, it's been written from Sherlock's, Mary's, John's and Lestrade's POV. </p><p>I love me my OT3, but I also ship Johnlock like it's my damn job, so I'm treating their relationships with each other separately before tossing them all together.</p><p>There is sexy sex in chapters 23 onwards...they can be read on their own for anyone who isn't interested in the, you know, plot part of PWP :D</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Homecoming 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Amilyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amilyn/gifts).



> I'm playing with lots of things in this fic: Point of view, dialogue, lots of different writing styles and trying to keep the characters in-character and the story cohesive throughout. I'd love to hear how everyone likes (or doesn't like!) how viewpoints and writing styles change chapter by chapter!!

“Baker Street,” Sherlock rasps from where he slouches in the seat of Mycroft’s town car, taking in night time London through the tinted glass when he can barely to keep his eyes open. It’s been 17 hours since Mycroft had unchained him and hauled him out of that fetid hole in Serbia.

“A&E.” Mycroft counters. Sherlock shakes his head violently, immediately regretting it as the world starts spinning.

“Baker Street.” Sherlock growls, his hand resting on the car door handle. The threat is clear. Mycroft knows his brother well enough to know that he actually will hurl himself out of a moving car if he thinks it necessary.

“Very well, but you should know that John no longer lives there.” Sherlock doesn’t answer for a moment and Mycroft suppresses a wince. There is so much Sherlock has to know, but absolutely no way to tell him. As usual, he will find out the hard way himself.

“Phone.” He says, holding his hand out. Mycroft sighs, reaches into his attache case, and removes Sherlock’s three year old phone. It is charged, of course. Sherlock checks their position from the window, waits five more minutes, then texts

_Come immediately if convenient._

He drops hand and phone into his lap and lets his head loll back against the headrest, allowing himself to close his eyes until he feels the car stop moving.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John gets a text and Mary does something about it.

“Oh, my God,” 

I wake up hearing John’s soft exclamation, but I don’t bother opening my eyes. Not quite rousing, I reach over to touch him, maybe rest my hand on his chest, maybe stroke his cheek. Any contact will often ease his nightmares before either of us needs to be fully awake. I open my eyes when I touch warm sheet instead of flesh. 

John’s sitting bolt upright, his face thrown into sharp, shadow-filled relief by the blue-white glow of the mobile phone in his hands. His eyes are wide and blinking, mouth working silently. I blink in confusion, trying to figure out what in hell would cause this reaction at -- what is it? Four AM? Jesus. “Is it Harry?” I ask, squinting against the light from the phone.

“It’s him,” John breathes finally, his eyes still locked on the phone, now cupped in his hands like a most precious jewel. 

“What?” I ask, and my mind starts ticking over, finally. “Who?” then, it hits me like a stab in the arm. “Oh. Oh! But - really?” There can be only one person in the world that could make John react like this. I feel a stab of self pity ‘cause it sure as shit is not me. 

I’m good at going from zero to sixty in no time. I slap the bedside lamp into light and jump towards my dresser. I have a bra and jumper on and am struggling into jeans when I realize my John hasn’t moved.

“Hurry up!” I say grinning, reaching for yesterday’s clothing where he left them crumpled on the floor. We were a little distracted when we go to to bed. I forgave him his sloppiness almost instantly. 

He’s still staring at his phone. Apparently pants hitting him in the head isn’t enough to pull him out of this shock. 

“John,” I say “If it’s him, and he’s texted you at four in the bloody morning out of the blue, he’s probably...well, from what you’ve told me, he’s probably a bit not good. Be shocked later.” 

John looks up from his phone and meets my eyes and I’m made instantly aware that that may have been a ‘bit not good.’ The shocked and shuttered expression on his normally mobile, open face is hard for me to take. Heartbreaking.

“Oh, love,” I say softly, crawling across the bed to him. I hold his gaze and cup his jaw gently, rubbing my thumb over his smile lines. He really has the most gentle face in the world. It’s one of the things I love about him. I’d do anything right now to get a glimpse of that gentleness to break through this mask he’s got on.

“You’re shocked and angry and hurt and betrayed, and you are well within your rights. This will doubtless be difficult. But I know you, John Watson, and you will never forgive yourself if you don’t get your arse off this bed and into those trousers and into a cab and over to Baker Street. Especially if something really is wrong. And I’ll be damned if I’m not coming with you.” 

I hate that my voice is shaking but I can’t help it. Every instinct in me is screaming that time is of the essence. I pick his pants up off the bed and them into his hands before turning to grab my phone off the bedside table. 

John grabs my hand and kisses my knuckles quickly and fiercely before jumping off the bed and following my instructions without a word. 

The small, cold little coil of fear that’s been winding around my heart relaxes just slightly. _Maybe - just maybe, there’s room for us both,_ I think as we bolt down the stairs and out the door. It’s the last such thought I’ll permit myself until we see what we find at Baker Street.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Surprise!

The downstairs door to Baker Street is unlocked when we arrive, but there is no light on in their landlady’s flat. I can practically feel tension radiating off John and it’s starting to make me jumpy. The thought that this whole thing could be a trick crosses my mind and I briefly regret that I hadn’t thought to conceal a gun somewhere upon my person. John’s never noticed before and with his level of preoccupation… but that’s neither here nor there. Here at the moment is the downstairs landing and there is the upstairs landing and that’s where we need to be. I nudge John, and we ascend the stairs quietly.

There’s a flicker of light coming from behind the door to 221B. John hesitates in front of the door, his left hand clenching, steeling himself for whatever he’ll find behind it.

I dig deep for some empathy...something to cover my abrasive impatience, and I clasp his cold, twitching hand in mind and squeeze, stilling the nervous tick. He squeezes back, sucks in his breath, tucks his chin in pushes through the door like he’s entering a war zone. Given their history I wonder if we’re not.

The flat looks empty at first glance, dimly lit by the christmas lights strewn over the mantle...christmas lights John and Sherlock had put up three years ago and never taken down, that had never been removed because neither he nor Mrs Hudson had been able to bring themselves to alter the flat. John scans the room, then looks down at the floor. Dust is eloquent, Sherlock had told him once.

I know this is true. Dust, you can trust, and sure as we’re standing here, there are tracks in the dust on the floor, leading into the kitchen past the fireplace.

Suddenly John moves. One moment he’s standing poised by my side, the next, he’s passed through parlor, through the kitchen and then there’s a thump and a muffled curse. I am suddenly rooted to the floor. Part of me wants to give him this moment and part of me...a much bigger part if I’m honest, wants to be there to have it with him. Indecision freezes me in a way that I’ve not experienced in years.

“Mary, help,” John calls from around the corner and I thank all the gods there are that I don’t have to suffer through that little bit of hell anymore as I almost run to him.

John’s, kneeling next to a long man sprawled face down on the floor. He’s already reached around the man’s throat and is taking a pulse.  In the twilight gloom, I can make out matted blond hair, an oversized dirty coat and battered shoes. I move carefully around him  to his other side, ghosting my fingers over a broad shoulder, and I look at John for direction. He’s staring down, his jaw clenched.  

“Sherlock?” he murmurs, and he’s doing that thing where his voice is distinctly at odds with his expression. His ability to do that always throws me.  “Can you hear me Sherlock? Christ, you’re burning up. Mary, help me roll him over,”

There’s a dark, deep moan, a hand twitches as I slot my hands under his shoulder and get ready to push.  “Back,” he says.

I’m not sure what I expected but that voice, broken and strained, is shockingly beautiful. I can almost feel it vibrate in my chest and I feel an instant surge of sympathy, which is so unexpected that I ignore it.

“No, I will not back off,” John mutters in confusion. Sherlock, since this is, apparently, him, is starting to really come around, and I can see his muscles tensing and flexing in pain.

“No, John, his back,” I whisper. There’s a grunt - of surprise or acknowledgement, I can’t tell. Probably both.

“Sherlock,” John’s voice is still soft. “You need to help us get you up if we can’t turn you over. You need to go to hospital.”

“No,” Sherlock rasps, and he moves suddenly, frantically pushing himself up until he’s kneeling on hands and knees. He can’t keep back a moan and I reach out at the same time John does to steady him, helping him upright. The smell coming off that coat is repulsive -- stale sweat and old blood and god knows what else -- and I feel my nose wrinkle despite myself. John catches my eye and grimaces.

“See?” Sherlock says, and that fine, deep voice cracks. I bite my lip, and the worry lines on John’s face grow deeper.  “I’m fine. Why are the lights out, John? I can’t see a thing.” he asks, and underneath the pain and exhaustion, there’s a note of petulant impatience. John makes a strangled sort of snort.

“You insufferable basta…” I cut him off,  covering his hand on Sherlock’s shoulder with mine. This is really not the time.  He falls silent, his jaw clenching to stem a flood of vitriol.

“Come on, hold him up...I’ll get the lights.” I say quietly and tilt my chin beckoning him over. Obligingly, he slides around in front of Sherlock, replacing my hand  with his own and keeping Sherlock from falling forward again. I get up to find the switch.

Only one of the fluorescent bulbs over the table flickers to life, but it’s enough. When I turn back to them, I feel my heart skip and I have to press my hand against my lips to keep from crying.

Sherlock and John are kneeling, foreheads pressed together. Sherlock’s hands are gripping John’s shaking shoulders and John’s hands are clasped about his head.

“I thought you were dead,” John chokes out and I feel like my heart is breaking all over again to hear him like that. “I actually believed you were dead.”

“For all intents and purposes, John,” Sherlock answers, his dark voice droll. “I was.”

My John, the living embodiment of ‘keep calm and soldier on,’  laughs shortly, hysterically.

“Come on,” He says, pulling Sherlock away gently. “Let me get you sorted so I can kill you properly in my own time.” I can see Sherlock’s fingers tighten on John’s shoulders, but they hardly depress the fabric. The man is shaking again, just from the effort of kneeling. John’s face hardens. “What have you done to yourself?” he asks softly. Sherlock shakes his head and levers himself to his feet, leaning almost entirely on John.  

He stands swaying for a moment, and then turns his head and looks straight at me. I meet his gaze, unconsciously reaching out the hand not pressed to my lips… I want to help, to do anything, but I can’t move. I can’t intrude unless I’m invited, a fact that rankles, even though I know it shouldn’t. After a moment of intense scrutiny, ( _what is he_ seeing?)  Sherlock’s eyelids sag and he sways again.

“If you would be so good as to lend your husband a hand, Mary, I’d appreciate it.”

I have to just breathe a second before moving towards them.

“Happy to,” I say, and my voice decides to play along with me for once, and I sound like I’m helping him carry up the shopping rather than helping him carry his dead-but-suddenly-alive-friend through the hall of a flat abandoned through grief. “But we’re not married.” I feel compelled to correct him, if only because I get the feeling that I won’t often get the chance to.

“Yet,” Sherlock answers softly.

“Shut it, Sherlock,” John growls as he adjusts Sherlock’s other arm over his shoulders. Sherlock grunts.  

I smirk as we move, half walking and half dragging Sherlock the rest of the way into his room. I stand in front of him to support him, and he leans against my hands as John removes the filthy jacket.

“Christ, Sherlock!” he says, and Sherlock roll his eyes. “Mary, we need to lay this giant idiot down on his stomach. His back’s...Christ. I’ll need to soak the shirt before we can get it off,” he grinds out.

“Hang on, Sherlock,” I say and he nods, pushing off me and standing back on his heels. When I’m sure John’s got him, I turn quickly and remove the cover on his bed, disturbing as little of the dust as possible. The sheets underneath are not made up...it’s as though he left his bed for the day just that morning. I get the pillows out of the way so he’ll be able to lie flat.

We lower him as gently as possible onto the mattress and he sighs as he settles there on his stomach.

“John,” he says, and Captain Watson snaps.

“Shut the _hell_ up, Sherlock. I don’t want to hear a word from you. Just...save your energy.  And I’m telling you right now, if I find infected wounds under that shirt, you are going to the goddamn hospital if I have to tie you up and carry you there myself.”

“I was just going to tell you to make tea,” Sherlock rumbles. There is a moment of silence and the dam bursts.

“Mother _fucker_ comes back from the dead and he wants tea." he bursts out, gesticulating wildly.  "Well, you’re not bloody well _getting_ tea, you sodding wanker, you’re getting bloody water from rusty bloody pipes, you bastard, and that’s all you deserve anyway…” John mutters as he stalks out of the room and starts slamming around the kitchen. I hear the distinct sound of a kettle, slammed up under the tap and I can’t keep myself from joining Sherlock as he starts to chuckle.

He looks up at me through his hair, and I find myself leaning over and smoothing a matt of it away from his forehead.  

“I’m Mary,” I say, smiling down at him.

“So I gathered,” he says. I’m unaccountably relieved that he hasn’t stopped smiling completely. I purse my lips, listening to John bang around the kitchen, shouting abuse at the kettle, the cupboards and everything else as he works himself through his snit.

“I love him,” I say suddenly. “We’ve been together over a year and I think I’ve helped him get through...well, that doesn’t much matter now, does it?” I can’t quite keep all the bitterness out of my voice.

Sherlock tilts his head up to see me better and it makes him wince. I wince too, mindful of the matted blood on his back and crouch down by his head so he doesn’t have to strain to see me. After a moment he blinks at me.

“For such a clever woman, you’re being remarkably obtuse,” he mutters.  “Of course it matters. Despite what my brother thinks, I’m well aware of what my little farce, necessary though it was, did to John --”

“No, you don’t know. You really don’t.”  I interrupt him.  There’s really nothing else to say. It’s not for me to tell him about the suicide attempts or the drinking...all of that is behind John now. Maybe it’s not for anyone to divulge to this man. I’m not sure.  “I’m sure you’ll have had good reasons…” I let that sentence hang, demanding.

“Assassins,” he says, and as he utters those syllables, his gaze focuses on me so sharply, I find myself rocking back on my heels. He says nothing more, regarding me silently. I fight hard to keep my face neutral. He’s good, obviously, but there is just no way on _earth_ \--

“What’s this about assassins?” John says, entering the room with a cup of tea and a straw. “No, don’t move your head, you bloody idiot,” he says, forestalling Sherlock. He crouches down next to me and holds the straw close to Sherlock’s mouth. Sherlock rolls his eyes but doesn't fight John, too thirsty to be obstreperous. For now. After Sherlock sucks down the last of the tea,  he meets John’s gaze.

“Assassins,” he says quietly, “Aimed at you by Moriarty. Your safety was conditional upon my death, as was Lestrade’s and Mrs. Hudson’s.”

John groans and sits heavily on the floor, leaning his head against the bed. I back off a little, considering.

They would have been in position before Sherlock had even made it to the roof. John had shown me once where he had been standing when Sherlock fell. In hindsight I can place the position of the gunman (or woman, for God’s sake) with almost complete certainty. The windows the building behind him...I feel nauseous suddenly, realizing how close it must have been. I look up and see Sherlock studying me, and it’s incredibly disconcerting.

“So you...You disappeared so you could...what? Find the assassins? You could have _told_ me,” John mutters bitterly.

“You were being watched too closely, John. No one in the scopes could know,” Sherlock says quietly.

“You don’t sound particularly sorry,” John bites out.

“I will never be sorry for saving your life.” Sherlock snaps back.

John glares at him, his jaw clenching along with his fingers.

I can’t help but scowl too, in sympathy. Surely there must have been another way… a less painful one.

“I do...regret the time apart,” Sherlock adds quietly, and a deep weariness has suffused his voice. “Can you get me something else to drink?” he asks. I have no idea to whom he addresses that request, but I hop up, snagging the mug from where it rests on the floor and sweep out of the room.

It’s suddenly too much for me in there, and they probably want some time alone to...do or say whatever it is they’d like to do or say without me there. As I fill the kettle, I feel as though a timer has started in my head, ticking away the moments until my world falls apart. Again.

I never expected to have to tell John about my past. I never wanted to, but this --  the way Sherlock had looked at me. He can’t know, but I’m fairly sure he’ll figure it out quick enough when he’s back on his game.

I slam the kettle down on the range, grinding my teeth in frustration as I head to the loo.  There are towels in a closet there, and they are surprisingly dust-less. I run the tap in the bathtub and wait for the water to get warm.  

I had been so close. So very close to just being able to leave it all behind me, and now this. I toss the towels into the warm water and soak them thoroughly, then wring them out enough that they won't drip down the hall to Sherlock’s room. As I enter the hall, I freeze, listening hard, the towels all but forgotten in my hands. I quietly make my way to the parlor, dropping the towels on the kitchen table on my way.  

A soft creak from the landing outside and what I can only describe as a minute change in air pressure informs me that there is someone _right_ on the other side of the door listening. They’re trying quite hard to be silent, but I’ve been picking out the furtive sounds of sneaks my whole life. The knob turns. 

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

I quickly move to the left of the door using to it to conceal me as it as it opens. As soon as I hear the (tall, heavy built, trained, armed) man take a step into the room, I reach around quickly and yank hard on the door, jarring it open and throwing the man hanging on to the door knob off balance. As he stumbles the rest of the way into the room I slam the door shut behind him and sweep his feet out from under him with my foot and land on top of his back as he lands on the floor, disarming him and twisting his empty hand up to his shoulder blades in one smooth movement. He shouts hoarsely and that’s a mistake because it allows his lungs to compress. I’m not overly motivated to lift the pressure on his back enough to let him inhale, but John comes around the corner at a run and stops short.

“Greg?” he says incredulously. “Mary, what the--”

Oh, shit.

“Um,” I say, jumping off the man and backing away, surreptitiously placing his gun on the coffee table. “Sorry. He surprised me. I wasn’t expecting anyone else here and given the current situation…” I drift off not sure how much to say. John’s already helping the guy off the floor, only half listening. DI Greg Lestrade, a good friend of John’s and Sherlock’s whom I have just pinned to the ground, gets to his feet, and he’s shaking John’s hand, grinning sheepishly.  
  
“Sorry about this, John. I intercepted the call for a potential breaking and entering and when I heard the address...I decided to come myself. You woke Mrs. Hudson, you know,” he says, grinning into John’s face, obviously happy to see him.

I instantly like this guy, and I really wish I hadn’t thrown him on the floor. I absently wonder why we haven't had pints with him before and then notice that John’s looking at me closely, a shadow of...something...ghosting over his eyes. The little timer in my head skips forward a few days, and I sigh.

“Going to introduce us, love, or am I going to wallow in awkward embarrassment for the rest of the night?” I ask, smiling hopefully.

“Sorry. Mary, this is Greg Lestrade. I’m sure I’ve mentioned him.” I nod, smiling. “Greg, this is my girlfriend, Mary,” he says, wincing slightly at the title like he always does. I wish he’d just propose so he can call me his fiancee. I’m pretty sure that would make him feel better when he introduces me.

“Quite the woman,” Greg says pressing my hand in a firm grip before leaning past me to pick up his gun. I smile apologetically but decide saying anything more will just make things more uncomfortable.

“Well, I’ll just go downstairs and tell Mrs Hudson it’s just you. I’m sure she won’t object to -- “

“John! If you don’t tell me what’s going on _immediately_ , I’m coming out there!” Sherlock’s voice peals out from his bedroom. Greg goes utterly still and all the color drains from his face. John’s already on his way back to the room to make sure Sherlock doesn’t attempt to move. I shift nervously from foot to foot.

“Short version?” I ask quietly. His wide, wet eyes snap to mine and he nods. “Not dead.” I say, struggling not to smile.

“Thank fucking God,” he mutters indignantly. “Hurt?”

I nod. “Pretty bad. And very weak. Wherever he was was more than a bit not good. In fact, I was just on my way to bring towels in. I’ll have to warm them up again.” Greg nods, staring towards the kitchen, clearly as torn as I had been before. “Oh go ahead,” I say, grinning recklessly, reaching forward and squeezing his arm briefly in sympathy. “The more the merrier.” I pass by him, scooping up the sopping towels from the kitchen table and carting them back to the loo feeling a little lightheaded.

I decide it has to be tonight. Before the sun comes up, I have to tell John Watson about...me. It’s not the right time, but then that’s the problem. I mean honestly. On which dinner-and-a-movie date do you bring up your past as a CIA assassin?

My heart hammers in my chest and potential situations play out behind my eyes. Now Sherlock’s back, he won’t have to forgive me...He won’t be alone. Tears are threatening, and now is just so not the time for that. I wring the hot towels out and bring them to his room, trying to keep the tension out of my face.

Greg’s standing next to John, scowling and grinning by turns, spouting abuse at Sherlock who still hasn’t moved, probably because John’s standing right by his head ready to push him back down if he tries. Greg ends his spiel smiling rather than scowling and nods me into the room.

As he turns to go, John reaches out and grabs his arm. “Don’t tell anyone yet, yeah? I mean, tell Mrs. Hudson, obviously. But he needs a few days of rest before...whatever happens happens.”

Sherlock snorts.

“Ridiculous. Fix up my back, get me some food and a few hours sleep and --”

“You! _Shut up_ ,” Captain Watson says, not even looking down. Sherlock shuts up. I wonder how long I’m going to have to hold wet towels in my arms and whether or not I’ll have to go heat them up again when Greg leaves, chuckling, promising to break it to Mrs. Hudson gently and ask her to give them a few hours.

John smiles fondly at me, relieving me of my moist burden and pecking me on the lips as the kettle, which I’d honestly forgotten about, starts to screech. Trust them to have the world’s most offensive sounding kettle. When I get back with tea brewing, Sherlock is gasping in pain as John covers his back with the warm toweling. John’s scowling as he lays a second layer of toweling on and smooths Sherlock’s matt of a fringe off his forehead again. It’s such a tender gesture...something ugly twists inside me and I place the tea on the bedside table with extra care.

“I’ll be just there if you need me,” I say to the room at large and get the hell out of there before I can say anything else.

 


	5. Chapter 5

It’s almost an hour later before John calls to me. He’s kneeling next to Sherlock with a pair of scissors. Sherlock appears to be sleeping.

“I’m going to cut this shirt off and pull it up,” he says. “And we’ll see where we’re at.” I nod, wondering what it is he wants me to do.

“Shouldn’t we wake him up first? Warn him?” I ask, getting the very uncomfortable impression that John wasn’t going to on purpose. He nods. _My_ John….

“Yes, of course,” he grumbles. “Sherlock? Sherlock, we’re taking your shirt off.”

Sherlock stirs, and his eyes fly open, his muscles tensing for a brief moment before the panic slides out of his body as he takes in his surroundings.

“Have Mary do it, she’s a nurse,” he mutters.

Honestly, the whole room reverberates when he talks. It’s incredible. John freezes, and I haven’t been with the man for over a year not to realize how much that hurt.

Sherlock raises an eyebrow. “Honestly John, ripping my shirt off in my bed? People will talk.”

John laughs shortly and we all relax, and I wonder if it’s always like this with Sherlock, if you always feel like you’ve put your foot in it. I hope not. I dislike the feeling intensely.

“They do little else,” John murmurs and Sherlock smiles. Before I can feel hurt by being out of the loop here, Sherlock explains.

“Moriarty abducted John approximately a year before the Fall,” he says and gasps as John starts peeling back the shirt. It strikes me as odd that real people use capital letters to describe actual events in their life. I stifle a smile and hold up the bedside bin ready to accept the scrap of bloody cloth. “Wrapped him in Semtex and set us up nicely. To see how I’d react.”

I struggle with the image of potentially exploding John a bit.

Sherlock gasps again. The water has softened the scabs considerably, but this is still a painful process. “And how did you react?” I ask, hoping to distract him so that he won’t move much.

He snorts. “I was terrified. John was disappointed in me for weeks because I felt nothing for the previous four victims who were treated similarly - strapped with explosives and left to wait while I solved the crime. Emotion, sentiment - these can be paralytics. I was paralyzed at the pool. My cognitive abilities slowed to the point where I was utterly useless. Fortunately for us, John was not so useless.”

Judging from John’s stillness and his small frown as he worked, this is a viewpoint he’s not heard before.

“What did he do?” I ask softly as John deposits one piece of cloth and goes back to cutting off more.

“He surprised James Moriarty. John grabbed him from behind, threw him off.” Sherlock said. “After he left, I, rather hastily, I admit, removed the semtex vest and the concealing coat and threw it as far away as possible. John quipped that he he was glad no one had seen me tear his clothing off in a darkened pool, fearing the social repercussions of gossip and now you understand our little joke. John, don’t make a meal of this, just get the damn thing off. A little more pain won’t kill me!”  Sherlock can apparently go from zero to bitch even faster than I can wake up.

“I’m not worried about the pain, you git. I’m worried about tearing open your abused back and making my work harder later. Shut it,” John says, his tone utterly at odds with his words. His eyes are dark and intent on his work, and I hazard a look. It’s not pretty. I can’t tell what they beat him with but it’s left ragged gashes of varying depths all across his shoulders and down his back. Whoever had done this had been left handed...It was a stick or some sort of rigid thing, I decide, not a whip. There’s too much bruising to be sure.

Sherlock’s looking up at me with bright eyes, the question clear.

“Not infected, that I can see,” I tell him. He raises an eyebrow. “You’ll have an intriguing scar pattern,” I suggest.

“You find scar patterns intriguing.” It’s not a judgement, merely an observation, but coming from him, I feel as though I have to qualify my comment.

“Scars are like maps to medical personnel, Sherlock. And to you, I’m sure. You can tell a lot about a person by the scars they wear.” I say, wondering for the first time what John’s been able to tell about me from mine.  John snorts, settling back on his knees and observing the torn flesh.

“Mary’s right. These wounds are too fresh to be infected yet, but we need to get it cleaned up and that’s going to really hurt.” Sherlock snorts. “If you can make it to the loo, this will be a lot more easily done in the tub.

Sherlock’s on his feet almost before John finishes. I’m impressed. He peels the rest of the shirt off and cocks an eyebrow at me.

“John always overreacts. I’m fine,” he says, even as he realizes that walking unaided is outside his current capabilities. He’s painfully thin, his ribs curving up like pressure ridges from his torso, deep indentations between each one.

“How did you even get up here, Sherlock?” I ask, grasping his arm and helping his make his way to the door. He scowls down at me and says “Mycroft.” It’s a funny word. I can only assume it’s a person. He stumbles slightly, but I get him over to the tub and he sits on the edge of it, gasping again. John comes in carrying a large medical kit. Sherlock eyes it speculatively.

“You stole that off an ambulance,” he says squinting up at John as he flicks the lights on.

John nods. “Yes I did. Problem?”

“Who, me?”

“Then shut it. I’m still angry with you.”

Sherlock frowns but doesn't say anything. The bathroom’s small, and I’m in the way.

“I’ll just wait outside, shall I?” I ask, breezing through the door. I check my phone in the kitchen. It’s almost 6 in the bloody morning. I text Sarah and tell her John’s ill and won’t be in tomorrow -- by which I mean later on today. Then I make my way over to the living room and turn around slowly really taking it in for the first time.

John didn’t often talk to me about his life here -- and when he did he was usually on his way to getting hammered at a pub. Those nights were always the same. We’d get there laughing and talking about the clinic or whatever and two pints in, the light would go out of his eyes and half way through the pint three, he’d tell me about part of a case, or mention how glad he was that someone else besides him would occasionally go get milk, and the light would die altogether. By pint five, he’d have grown quiet. If we were with anyone else, they’d start to notice. If we didn’t make it home before pint number six, he’d turn some corner in his mind and start picking fights in the most subtle way I’ve ever seen anyone pick a fight. Every single brawl he’d get into he’d win, and no one could ever pin starting anything on him. After the third time he mentioned the milk, I stopped buying it. Picking it up seemed to make him happy.

What I’m getting at, I guess, is that he never described this place, and yet I feel as though I’ve been here before. It’s exactly what I would have expected, had I any expectations at all. It screams bachelor, but in a really posh sort of voice.

There’s the sound of water running in the bathroom. Hopefully John’s using the spray nozzle to get the bits of crap out of those wounds.

All of a sudden, I’m tired. Really, bone weary as I haven’t been for years. I sit down heavily on the chair that I would bet my best knife is John’s and it’s so right. The only thing that would make it more right is the addition of eight hours of sleep or a good scotch.

I look around, wondering what kind of posh bachelor liquor they’d have, rationalizing that I deserve it by now. I get up and poke around a cabinet and am rewarded by a cluster of bottles. There’s a cheap gin (John) and a few of the more typical modifiers. Then I see it, glinting from the back of the shelf.

A lone crystal decanter (definitely Sherlock) filled with clear brownish amber liquid. I pause before I remove the top, wondering if I can guess what kind of spirit that man would keep in a decanter like this. I don’t know him well enough to guess whether he’d be gilding the Jameson lily or enshrining Octomore in a housing it deserves. I decide, suddenly and without a doubt that it must be the latter.

I lift the crystal top and smile, gratified that I’m right. The smell of it… it’s incredible.  I can practically hear the waves beating on the shores of Islay. I reach for the low ball tumbler in back of the bottles. Except, as I pull it out I realize it’s actually an antique graduated beaker with measurement markers hand etched into the side.  (Sherlock again of course.)

It makes me smile, this kind of thing, and I can’t help but grin as I pour precisely about a little more than two fingers and cork the decanter setting it back in the cabinet. I take John’s seat and sip slowly, relishing the warmth of softly glowing peat fires infusing my chest as I sip. A bit of liquid courage has never gone amiss. I regard the growing glow from the opening of the curtains across the room and realize that I’ll probably miss my daylight confession deadline.

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

John reaches over the back to the chair, cupping my shoulders in his hands and lays a soft kiss on my neck, waking me from the drowse I’d settled into. I snuggle upwards against him, relishing the touch of his hands while I can.

That rather unpleasant thought wakes me up the rest of the way. My poor John. He looks wasted. He’s so tired, he’s sagging over the back of the chair. The tumbler/beaker almost falls from my lap where it lay, forgotten, but I catch it and put it on the table next to the chair.

“Nice catch,” John says smirking.

“His nibs sleeping?” I ask him and he chuckles.

“His Nibs indeed.” He says, his face wreathed in a quick smile. “Why’d I never think of calling him that? It’ll infuriate him. Yes, His Nibs is finally  sleeping and judging by the ‘paracetamol’ tablets I gave him, he’ll be sleeping for at least four hours. During which time, I’d like to do the same. Come with me?”

“I’ll settle you, love, then I’ll run to the shops.” I say, knowing that there’s no chance I’ll actually get to sleep right now after my short nap with my timer ticking down.  He must see something in my face because he frowns as I lever myself up out of the chair.

“Mary, I love you. Nothing in the world can make me love you less. Not Sherlock, not…” he catches himself and frowns harder, staring at the ground and I feel ice forming around my heart.

“Not what, John?” I ask. “What’s he said about me?”

When he looks up, his eyes are anxious.  “Honestly, Mary, nothing I didn’t already know. He asked me if I knew you had a secret.” His jaw works and my heart jackhammers into my throat.

“And?” I ask, unwilling to say more. I wanted to do this on my terms but it seems as though I missed the chance.

“I told him I knew,” John says simply, his eyes gentling. He reaches for me but I can’t bring myself to go to him yet. “And that I didn’t care, and that he would let us...come to terms with it in our own time. I was very, very clear on that last bit. He will keep any deductions of his to himself.”

I feel tears sting my eyes. I’m so damn exhausted and overwhelmed, I can’t keep them back. I just stand there and start crying.  He murmurs something and wraps his arms around me and I cling to him. It’s a gift. Every thing he does, everything he is, is like a gift to me.

“Thank you, John. Thank you,” is all I can manage say. He strokes my hair and we rock slightly.

“I do hope...I hope you’ll tell me sometime,” he says, gently pulling me back so he can meet my eyes. I cup his face in my hands and rub my fingers over the tired lines etched in the corners of his eyes.

“I was going to tell you tonight. Last night. But..” My eyes drift towards Sherlock’s room. John laughs shortly and leans against me.

“Yeah. Honestly, don’t. Not now. I can’t handle any more surprises at the moment,” he says, squeezing his eyes shut and resting his chin on my head. I wrap my arms around his shoulders.

“Come, my love, let us unearth your bed from layers of dust and get you horizontal on it.” I say, leading him towards the stairwell door. He follows frowning, then stops.

“Better on the sofa,” he says, “so I can hear him if he…”  I smile at him, pushing him gently towards the leather sofa. It looks comfortable enough, and it would be useless to argue.

“Go on, then, I’ll just go up and get a blanket and a pillow,” I say, and head up the stairs. John’s room is… Well there’s certainly a bed in it. It certainly is a bed room. Of course, unlike the rest of the apartment, this room has been stripped bare of almost everything. John had taken what he needed with him. I found the few things left behind to be an absolute education in Johnish-ness.

Never one for nostalgia, he had only a very few non essential things at our place. Sherlock’s deer-stalker, his old cane, a skull, his army medals and a few pictures of mates dead and gone. Here, there were other things, talismans from his life with Sherlock before the Fall (God, even I’m calling it that now) that he’d purposefully neglected to take with him. A .357 bullet casing on the dresser. An oatmeal colored cable knit sweater discarded on the bottom the empty wardrobe. A dressing gown, crumpled onto the floor in the corner. I pull the cover off the bed and reach for the pillow and pause. There’s something hard and plasticine under it. I hold it up.

It’s a magnifying glass. The kind that pops out of a plastic housing. Under his pillow. I think of John, in the time before he met me, before he moved out but after Sherlock was gone, waking in the night, from a nightmare or from sadness, alone, and fisting his hand around this. I fist my hand around it now, feeling the sharp corners dig into the inside of my knuckles as a few tears trickle hot down my face. I allow myself one muffled sob before hastily wiping the tears from my eyes and pocketing the glass. I bundle his pillow up in the cover and bring both downstairs.

He’s already asleep, his head propped up on the sofa arm, so I just tuck the cover around him gently. He doesn’t stir at all, completely sacked out. I smile at him fondly, fingering the glass in my pocket before making my way through the kitchen to Sherlock’s room to check on him before I go out.

Sherlock is totally unconscious. John somehow got him cleaned up really well. His hair lies in damp, dark curls over his face which, relaxed in sleep, looks at least ten years younger and so...beautiful. I can see the thick pads and bandages bound to his back through the sheet pulled up to his neck. I pull the magnifying glass from my pocket and place it quietly on the bedside table next to the glass of water which is in easy reach.

“Thank you,” I whisper. “Thank you for his life. Thank you for coming back to him,” I feel foolish, saying these things, talking to a sleeping man. His eyes flutter, and for a moment I think I woke him, but he just shifts, bringing a long-fingered hand up to rest on the pillow beside his face, nuzzling the pillow with his cheek. I turn and make my way quietly out of the apartment, leaving the two in each other’s sleeping company.  

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

The beautiful, subtle cacophony of London at midday is like a balm to me as I wake up, the utter familiarity of the sound of my city pervades my consciousness allows me to rise relaxed, unperturbed.  It is the first time I have slowly slipped from sleep to consciousness without fear in six hundred and twelve days and I allow myself to bask for a moment and just breathe. My back aches, but I am clean and that, too, is an absolute luxury, much appreciated.

There is a millimeter of dust on the surface of the bedside table disturbed only by the placement of a glass of water, my magnifying glass and the prints of the middle, ring and pinky finger of the left hand of whoever had left the water for me.

I have never succeeded in a long term study of the accumulation of dust in a domestic environment, my failure due entirely to John and Mrs. Hudson’s irritating propensity to dust, wipe, wash and hoover every surface of our flat over the course of a two week to sixteen day cycle (the deviation in cycle is contingent on the weather’s effect on Mrs. Hudson’s hip.)

 As a result of this egregious deprivation, I find have no idea how long it took her to stop coming up there after John had moved out. John moving out. That thought opens up an entirely different avenue for me to hurtle down.

John and Mary. Mary and John. Just over a year, she’d said. I close my eyes, scrolling through all the data I have accumulated about her so far.

Clever, kind, attractive, single child of a single mother, part time nurse, disillusioned liberal dem, cat lover who bakes her own bread, has a degree in linguistics, several scars and a secret tattoo.

And another secret which she has lied about to everyone including John.

Clever indeed. And _Interesting_.

She’s basically a female John with a _secret_. I smile.

People with secrets are much less dull than those without, and since hers involves scarring in some way, it’s bound to be at least somewhat interesting.

I realize I am looking forward to deducing this secret. I find this strange because, as soon as Mycroft informed me that John had moved out of our flat, I surmised both the fact that he had moved in with a woman and that I would despise her if not on principle, then out of jealousy.

And yet. And yet when I had called for John, he’d come, which I admit, I feared for ten excruciating minutes that he would not, and not only did she not detain him, but she had come with him and helped him. Helped me.  I admit that was a total surprise.  

As was her singular expression of sympathy as she stood in our -- in my kitchen, hand outstretched.  Such was not the first expression I expected from someone who would, quite rightly, consider me a rival for John’s time and affection.  Certainly resentment and suspicion had been the reactions of the tarts John’s with whom John had previously graced our flat.  Mary’s initial, unguarded reaction could not have differed from theirs more.

And then there is her service to John. Well, I say service. Even to me that sounds callous.

I can reliably say that I know John Watson better than I know any other human on this planet, and yet I must now admit that I drastically miscalculated the effect that the Lazarus plan had on him, though I still hold it was necessary.

When I met him, John had been damaged and traumatized by his stint in Afghanistan, but had proven remarkably resilient. Apparently that resilience, upon which I had counted so heavily, had not applied in this situation. I do not know why, and I dislike not knowing. It certainly is another mystery to solve.

But I digress. In short, I cannot imagine meeting John in his current state and not only caring for him but falling in love with him and yet Mary has done both. She had kept him safe and brought him happiness at a dark time in his life and owe her a debt for that. I will find a way to repay this debt. If it has something to do with her secret, all the better.

I hear the door open downstairs and the murmur of voices. I am not to be spared Mrs. Hudson’s fluttering for more than another thirty seconds. I briefly consider feigning sleep, but this needs doing eventually.

She will be hurt, and it will bother me that I have hurt her. Mrs. Hudson is as dear to me as my own mother thinks she is. Again, I find myself needing to reaffirm the necessity of what I’ve done. None of these people would be here to be angry with me if I hadn’t. It’s some solace at least. Mycroft’s adage about sentiment is sometimes quite apt. It is not an advantage in cases like this.

I sit up slowly, careful not to move my shoulders or back more than necessary which is far harder than it has any right to be. John’s dressings are good, they do not shift. No surprise there. I want badly to stretch, but I can only imagine the agony of my skin were I to do so. Instead I reach for the glass of water, thoughtfully left within easy reach.

As I sip, the fingerprints catch my eye as the curtain shifts in a draft and allows more sunlight to fall onto the bedside table.  They must be Mary’s. I would recognize John’s anywhere and Lestrade had not had the decency to bring me a drink while he harangued me.

I narrow my eyes and the noise of John greeting Mrs. Hudson and Mary putting shopping down on the kitchen table fades into the background as the ridges and whorls of the prints seem to leap from the table at my eyes. I slam the glass down spilling water onto my pillow and snatch my magnifying glass from the table, snapping it open and bending over the prints, still picked out vibrantly in the sunlight.

There it is. I am not mistaken. The tented arch on the little finger. It’s not even a partial, it’s as clear as day. My heart beats faster. The rarest fingerprint on earth. Rare enough on other fingers, but on the little finger…The odds of seeing it outside of a textbook are astronomical.    

I’m suddenly aware of three sets of eyes staring at me with varying expressions from the doorway.

“Oh _Sherlock_!” Mrs. Hudson cries and I know I should acknowledge her, but there are priorities.

“Don’t move. Don’t anyone move,” I command, and I gingerly rise and make my way to my bureau, pulling open one drawer then another until I find what I’m looking for. I return, upending the kit on my bed and selecting the appropriate dark powder and brush. Oh so gently I apply the barest coating of dust over the fingerprints on the nightstand and reverently press the lifting tape over them. Then I hold it up to the light, and then against a backing card. Perfect ridge development. Just...perfect.

I can’t help but sigh and I turn to Mary, reaching for her hand and holding it closer to my eyes for scrutiny. It’s there, in the flesh, I can see it and I feel almost giddy.

“What a beautiful gift you have,” I murmur, peering closer.

“Eh. For doing the shopping or landing in awkward situations with my boyfriend’s best mate?” Mary asks, tugging lightly at her hand.

“Sherlock,” Mrs. Hudson says, disapproving.

I look up and the first thing I notice is John’s expression. If I was John, writing in his blog, I would call it thunderous. Since I most assuredly am _not_ , I will describe it as it actually is: petulant.

It occurs suddenly to me that I’m standing in nothing but my shorts seriously contemplating kissing the pad of Mary’s little finger which I have refused to relinquish.

It occurs to me that this might seem...odd to anyone not blessed with my phenomenal powers of observation and laudable priorities. I decide to explain myself in a way which no one in their right minds would misunderstand.

“Tented arch,” I announce, smiling and hefting Mary’s hand to show John, gently extending her little finger. “Right there.”

“Um, what?” John says, his brows furrowing further. I wonder if he’s trying to decide weather to be excited about my discovery or annoyed by the fact that he had missed it for ‘just over a year.’

It occurs to me after three consecutive seconds of silence that it might be possible that neither of these reactions is to blame for his expression. Misunderstanding then. Ignorance. Dull. My eyes roll of their own accord.

“It’s the rarest print on Earth.” I say, shifting my grip on Mary’s wrist and I freeze. The pulse beneath my fingers is hammering so hard it’s a wonder I can’t actually see it. A quick look out of the corner of my eye reveals dilated pupils, engorged capillaries--a blush rising just above her collar and over her cheeks.

Ah. Hmmm.

I drop Mary’s hand and assume a posture of outrage.

“Might I be allowed to become decent before accepting visitors?” I growl, gesturing to my obvious state of undress. Mary barks out a laugh and Mrs. Hudson titters.

“Alright,” Mary shouts, turning to the others, arms outflung. “Everyone out! His Nibs wants time to become decent!” John immediately grins at this ridiculousness.

“His Nibs? Mycroft is the Holmes brother best suited to that title!” I roar after them. Mary winks over her shoulder.

“How long do you think it will take him to become decent John?” she asks.

I slam the door before I can hear his inevitably infuriating answer and flop gingerly onto the bed. Flopping gingerly is something I’ve become quite adept at doing over many years of various injuries which I wish to remain hidden. I’m quite proud of that ability and it mollifies me somewhat. As does the amazing print in my hand. I resolve to have it framed. After blogging about it of course.

I will be the envy of the five forensic scientists worth a damn in the world. I get up and pull open some more drawers in my bureau, retrieving a pair of cotton pyjama trousers and exchanging them quickly for silk ones. I’ve just been tortured, after all, I deserved to furnish myself with all the comforts of home. I insert myself into my favorite dressing gown and put my ear to the door.

Mary’s discussing lunch options and has just asked what Mrs. Hudson thinks I want to eat. I swing out of the door, rushing to insert myself into the conversation by informing them direly that I won’t be eating, calculating (correctly) that John’s ensuing snit about my eating habits will distract him from the more irritating and awkward snit he was going to have about me almost kissing Mary’s hand dressed only in my shorts.

I gradually allow them to work me around to accepting a full English breakfast, which is just what I wanted anyway, and allow myself to relax and enjoy the dulcet tones of John regaling the ladies with a detailed dissertation of the finer points of my, apparently awful,  personality. I risk a glance at Mrs. Hudson and am taken aback by the tears in her eyes which are so incongruous with the smile on her face. I reach my arm around the back of her chair and pull her closer as the smell rashers infuses the air.

 


	8. Chapter 8

“Sherlock _bloody_ Holmes.”

“John, you know I prefer texting to...this.”

“Yes, the last thirty messages delivered on the minute _every_ minute are just the reminder I needed. I’m calling you because apparently texting you to leave me alone isn’t enough. Stop. Texting. Me. AT WORK, Sherlock!”

“Please, John, you call that work? I have a real job for us and you’re going to pass it up to diagnose another case of thrush or to examine an undescended testicle? This is your third double shift in as many weeks. One would think you’d be thrilled to leave.”

“It’s my job, Sherlock, and I need it. I can’t bloody well hare off after you whenever you want anymore.”

“Too bad, John. Since your ability to prioritize has utterly disintegrated during my absence, I have no choice but to pursue alternative options. Consider yourself fired.”

“Fired? _Fired_?  You’re _firing_ me? _You’re_ firing _me_?”

“Repetition is dull. Mary asks that I remind you that we’re to go to dinner at Angelo’s tonight.”

“You stupid sod. You can tell Mary dinner’s off!”

“I can, but I won’t. I’m not your secretary, John. Last I checked, you were mine, but as I said, you’re fired. See you at seven.”

“...Sherlock?”

“Yes, Mary?”

“You’re a right bastard when you mean to be.”

“Evidently, I’m a bastard even when I don’t mean to be, a circumstance which has just lead to the unfortunate loss of an assistant at a very inconvenient time.”

“He refused you again?”

“Obviously. It seems that your theory that ‘time heals all wounds’ is every bit as useless as it seemed when you said it.”

“It’s only been three weeks, Sherlock.”

“Three weeks is an eternity. Certainly a long enough period for any rational person to process the circumstances surrounding my absence and the imminently good reasons I had for making myself scarce. John’s unexpected intransigence in this matter is totally illogical and I have just run out of patience.”

“Illogical? Certainly. Unexpected? Only to you, Sherlock. You really don’t know anything about human nature do you?”

“Human? No. Nature?…No.”

“Not to worry. I’ll talk him ‘round. It’ll take some time, but I’ll talk him ‘round.”

“Ah, _now_ I can rest easy.”

“You really are a bloody wanker.”

“So I’ve been told. Mmm.”

“What?

“It occurs to me that since you’re already here you may be able to be of some use.”

“Woman-kind was not meant to handle such poignant flattery.”

“Sarcasm does not become you.”

“I wish I could say the same for you.”

“Yes, well. Um. Thank you. I suppose.”

“Your Nibs, will you condescend to inform me of how I might be of some small service to you?”

“Mary, you’re insufferable. I have no idea how John lives with you, honestly I don’t.”

“Practice. What do you need help with, Sherlock? I haven’t got all day.”

“Of course you have all day. What else could you possibly have to do?  And I don’t _need_ help.”

“Of course you don’t need help. You called me all the way across town just because you want to put me to ‘good’ use. Is it tea you want, or biscuits? I can bake some, of course, but you knew that.  Or would you like me to hoover for you or polish all the doorknobs in the apartment. Or perhaps --”

“A client is coming in half an hour. I’ve already accepted the case, though it’s little more than a 3. There is an...emotional element that is proving difficult for me to understand--possibly the only thing about an otherwise open and shut case that continues to elude me. John usually provides me with useful observations in this area but given his unreasonable--”

“Illogical, foolish, irrational, preposterous, excessively sentimental reaction to the reappearance of his dead, mourned-for best mate--”

“--I can no longer depend upon his input. You have it exactly right. Why are you glaring at me?”

“Because if I shoot knives at you with my eyes, I don’t have to resort to, you know, actually stabbing you.”

“Knives are your weapon of choice then? Interesting. I would have put money on poison, but that would have been stereotyping. You like to get up close and personal then?”

“Don’t try to deduce me when you’re asking me for _help_ on a case.”

“Don’t try to evade my deductions by attempting to antagonize me.”

“You’re just stroppy because you’ve had three weeks and still haven’t figured me out.”

“Smugness does not become you.”

“Tell, me Sherlock, what _does_ become me?”

“Polite acquiescence and silence!”

“And how many times were you told that as a child? Oh! Sorry, Sherlock, low blow, sorry, really.”

“...I don’t require tactile reinforcement of your apology to accept it, Mary.”

“So tilting your head, relaxing your posture and smirking are your tells for ‘no contact needed’? Let me file that away for later under ‘load of bollocks.’ Now tell me about the case. I’ll do what I can to suss out this deplorable element of sentiment that you are clearly so unaware of you don’t even recognize it in yourself.”

“Mrs. Elizabeth Brooks-Channing believes that her diamond engagement ring has been stolen from her locked jewelry safe to which only she and her husband have the combination. She is anxious to recover it before her husband discovers it is missing. It is apparently worth quite a lot of money. Here’s the picture she sent.”

“Ohh, beautiful! Graph’s by the look of it.  I can see why you rate the case a 3 though. I’m surprised you’re taking it at all.”

“Apparently, I have bills to pay. Thoughts on the case rather than my current financial situation would be _greatly_ appreciated.”

“First guess would be the help, but that’s not right.”

“How do you know?

“Because you said sentiment, Sherlock, and there’s nothing sentimental about the maid nicking a ring.”

“Ah.”

“Ah?”

“I assumed you thought a maid could not pick the lock.”

“Hardly. Jewelry safes are not usually heavy enough not to be tipped up enough to get the serial number and 90% of lock picking is just knowing how to look up the factory combination. Or if it’s a factory key that’s needed, a word in the right locksmith’s ear could have that ordered.”

“Interesting.”

“What’s interesting? Don’t tell me you don’t know about lock picking.”

“Of course I know about lock picking. And I now know that _you_ know about lock picking. And body language.”

“Stop trying to deduce me while I’m helping you with a case!”

“Stop making it so easy.”

“Ugh. Whatever. Deduce away, you’ll never figure it out without help. The husband then. Which, honestly, makes more sense. Any recent money trouble? Maybe he hocked the ring and was too ashamed to tell her?”

“That would be the most logical conclusion. Good job, Mary.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s nevertheless the _wrong_ conclusion.”

“You ponce, you’re actually preening over there. I see you. The next time I help you with anything, you have to tell me everything about the case all at once.”

“You’re assuming there will be a next time. How optimistic. Charles Brooks has recently become very wealthy due to quite a bit of judicious investing. Mrs. Brooks-Channing insists that their marriage is a happy one, and I see no evidence to refute that. There is no logical reason to hock the ring. That’s where I require your insight. I need a motive.”  

“You’re wrong.”

“I’m not. About what?”

“There are two potential logical reasons.  I need the date of their engagement and the state of his finances at that time and I bet fifty quid I will be able to tell you exactly why he took that ring.”

“What relevance could the date of their engagement possibly have? They have been married for six years.”

“Find me the relevant information and I will give you a relevant answer. Do it quick, and we’ll have it solved before she even gets here. Off you pop. And don’t even think about using my laptop, you’ll never guess the password.”

“Why would I want to use your ancient machine? It wouldn’t even boot up fast enough for me to...here we are. Mrs. Brooks-Channing’s facebook feed.  They were engaged 8 years ago on May sixth. They had just moved “up” into a small flat in Brixton. There’s his financial status right there.”

“There’s some nice places in Brixton.”

“The flat that they moved into is not one of those places. What is your conclusion?”

“That the ring he took is a fake. He’s now going to replace it with the real thing.”

“Preposterous.”

“Why?!”

“Why would anyone bother replacing a fake ring when the woman who owns it is too dim to notice it was fake in the first place?”

“You mean why would a man who wants so badly to buy his beloved the ring of her dreams go through the trouble of having a fantastic copy created until he could buy her the gift she truly deserves when he can afford it without bankrupting them? Oh, I don’t know. Love, devotion, that kind of thing.”

“I need proof.”

“There are whole businesses built around making convincing copies of desired rings and settings. Look back through his financial records and you’ll be able to find one of those companies in there. Or, better yet, just call the man and ask him.”

“I can’t just call him. It’s a gross breach of client-consulting detective confidentiality. I’ll just break into his bank account.”

“Yeah, sure, that’s far more legal.”

“Don’t question my methods, Mary.”

“Don’t question my conclusions, Sherlock. Especially when you clearly would never have figured out why he did it.”

“Don’t be absurd. It would have taken longer, certainly, but I would have -- does ‘Truly Diamonds’ sound familiar?”

“Don’t ask me, just Google it.”

“Ah, so you are aware of it. You squint with your left eye and flare your nostrils when you’re surprised and agitated, if we’re talking tells. It appears as though you are right. Their website showcases a number of expensive looking rings designed to rook the gullible and a £2,000 charge shows up two weeks before the engagement.”

“£2,000? Wow. Normally they’re cheaper. It’s sweet. Oh, don’t look at me that way, you mad bastard. This kind of sentiment is a good thing.  What are you going to tell her when she gets here?”

“The truth.  Her husband took the ring. Case solved. I hope she brought her cheque book.”

“Nope.”

“Excuse me?”

“You have...probably five minutes to figure out some pretense for bringing her out here. I am not allowing you to botch this for them just to collect your fee.”

“First you want me to betray consulting detective-client confidentiality and now you want me to lie to said client. Does your depravity know no bounds? Fortunately for Mrs. Brooks-Channing, I have a great deal more professionalism than you.”

“Sherlock! You’re _not_ telling her.”

“I am, in fact. And I’d appreciate it if you didn’t make a scene in front of my client. Incidentally, the knives are in the top leftmost drawer in the kitchen in case you run out of ones to ‘shoot from your eyes.’”

“I know precisely where your knives are.”

“Then ostensibly you are also aware of the location of the tea. I think I’ll take you up on your earlier offer, if you don’t mind. Make a pot actually, there’s the bell now.”

“It’s ringing from your refrigerator.”

“Yes, but DON’T OPEN-- ah. I’ll explain that later. Tea, please. Mrs. Hudson is letting her in now.”

“If you tell her, Sherlock, I’ll tell John that you sleep with one of his jumpers. I saw the pattern on your face when you let me in. It’s the one he left in his wardrobe upstairs.”

“Yes, hello, Mrs. Brooks-Channing. Have a seat.”

“Mr. Holmes, are you well?”

“What? Yes, of course. Would be better if my assistant had tea ready for us as I asked. She’s new. I’m still breaking her in. It’s so hard to get good help.”

“Oh no, please don’t go to the trouble on my account, but thank you. I haven’t much time before I meet my husband for dinner. What was it that you needed to ask me about? Did you get my email with the picture of the ring? Have you made any progress? He’s sure to notice I haven’t been wearing it...”

“I can assure you I’ve been working on your case. I needed only to confirm the make and model of the safe and it’s location in your house.”

“The safe is a Casoro. It’s in our bedroom next to the wardrobe.”

“Sherlock, _sir_ , those details were stated in the email. Surely there was something else you needed to ask her for in person?  Sorry to interrupt, Mrs. Brooks-Channing. Sherlock often forgets some little detail or other. It’s part of my job to remind him and I’m _so keen_ on doing a good job.”

“Of course, Miss, um...”

“Morstan. Mary Morstan.”

“Of course, Miss Morstan. Mr. Holmes, was there something else? I really must be on my way…”

“Ah, yes. I’ve apparently forgotten.”

“Well you have my contact information should you remember.”

“Yes.  Good day.”

“Sherlock, shut the door.”

“Oh, pardon me, I suppose I wasn’t being clear enough. You’ve fulfilled your role. You may leave.”

“That seems like letting me off easy. I haven’t made tea yet or hoovered the floor. The state of it, Sherlock, honestly.”

“Get out.”

“Nope.”

“I could force you.”

“I’ll add that to the list of things to tell John you said, shall I? We’ll leave together in a few minutes. It’s almost time for dinner or had you, ahem, forgotten?”

“You can tell John that dinner is off.”

“I could but I won’t. I’m not your secretary. John is, and don’t you bloody well forget it.”

“Insufferable!”

“So you’ve said.  And you’re an unfeeling, callous, cantankerous _git_. So we’re a matched set. Except of course that we’re not. And since three weeks is apparently an eternity, there is no reason why we have not yet had this conversation.”

“To what conversation are you referring? To my knowledge, I’ve done nothing for the past few minutes but order you from my flat.”

“Sherlock! Stop pacing and sit down and listen.

“The conversation to which I’m referring is the following:

“You admit to me under great duress that you love John Watson in ways you don’t even understand. I smile knowingly and tell you that I know and that it’s all right and you get upset because I’ve figured out something that you didn’t even know about yourself.

“Discomfited, you lash out, informing me how lucky I am that you’re not purposely sabotaging my relationship with him because, oh, you could.

“I forbear to mention how he’s purposefully cut you out of his life since you’ve been back. All I would have to do to be rid of you is let him. I forbear because someone has to be the fucking adult here. Forbearance is a virtue.

“Next, I grudgingly admit that I’ve been doing nothing the past few weeks but trying to convince John that he’s being an ungrateful, self-centered, myopic prat, and confess guiltily that I am having limited success because it is not me from whom he needs to hear these things, but from you, who don’t even know what ‘these things’ are. And I know that’s through no fault of your own.

“I will then, somewhat tearfully it seems, explain to you that I would do anything to fix what is broken if only to see the light that sparked in his eyes the night you came home, to find the gentleness that has been missing from his face since then. And that’s why I set up dinner tonight and I’m glad I did.

“You said you needed help with a problem of sentiment, and Sherlock, you could not be more right. But it has nothing to do with the Brooks-Channings. Please let me help you help John. … Sherlock?”

“Something long and flowing, possibly silk in red and white -- possibly, no definitely, hand painted. Sweetheart bodice.”

“Sherlock Holmes, are you fucking solving fucking crimes right now?”

“After a fashion. I’m attempting to answer an earlier question as well as solve a crime of conscience. You asked, I believe, what becomes you. A dress like that on you would make John the envy of every man alive. And while I’m in the mood for confession, I lied earlier.  Sarcasm does become you. Beautifully. Why are you still...leaking?”

“Your Nibs? I request the favor of tactile reinforcement for that apology.”

“Very well. Give me your hand...How’s that for tactile reinforcement?”

“You just wanted to get my tented arch closer to your mouth. But it counts, I suppose. Apology accepted. Come on, we’re about to be late.”

“You might want to freshen up, Mary. It’s dreadfully apparent that you’ve been weeping.”

“Oh, I’m counting on it. John can’t stand to see me cry, can’t deny me anything. How do you think I managed to convince him to get those three abstract panels behind the sofa at our place?”

“I wondered. They’re horrid. But abhorrent taste in art aside, you’re brilliant.”

“That, from this source, is something I will take to my bloody grave.”


	9. Chapter 9

Predictably, Angelo sits me down at the window table and I sigh, resigned. He means well, and it is a nice seat. I don’t even object when he puts the candle on the table. After all, Mary will be here too and she looks lovely by candlelight.

I sigh and sip the whiskey that magically appears on the table, relaxing slightly as the warmth spreads through my chest. It’s good to be a regular at a restaurant. I find myself devoutly hoping we won’t end up doing anything that puts our continued custom at risk.  

They’re late, which is typical of Sherlock, but not for Mary. I wonder idly what they got up to all afternoon and immediately regret thinking about it. Sherlock had a case on, and Mary was right there...I can damn well guess what they were getting up to.

Something ugly twists in my chest and I press my eyes shut. I’m so bloody tired of this feeling. But then, I’m tired of everything at the moment. I consider asking Mary to go on a quick holiday. I don’t care where, just away, but I know it’s useless while she’s on this damn crusade to fix me and Sherlock.

And there they are. That ugly thing twists a little and about doubles in size as I watch them come through the door, arm and arm. Mary’s smiling that bemused little smile that means that Sherlock has just said something ridiculous.

Two people have no bloody right to look so good standing next to one and other, and I realize that I hate it more than I have ever hated anything.

I scrub at my eyes with my hands so I don’t have to watch them come across the restaurant towards me. Mary pecks me on my cheek and plops down beside me, bumping into my shoulder as she removes her coat. Sherlock settles into his seat across from us, not bothering with his coat. I feel a stab of hope that he’s not planning on staying long.

“How was clinic today, love?” Mary asks, hauling a menu into her hands.

“Yes, John, regale us with your scintillating tales of swollen tonsils and thrush-infected pensioners.”

“Sherlock!” Mary practically snarls at him. “You promised.”

He shoots Mary a guilty look and presses his lips together, turning his attention to the street outside the window.

I feel an odd sense of dislocation, a feeling of deja vu so strong it’s actually disorienting. The lights outside, the cab pulling up down the street. It’s so similar to the first time we ate here that, were I any more paranoid, I would swear it had been staged.The scene is not lost on Sherlock, judging by his stillness.

“So, any progress?” I find myself asking wondering briefly what I’m even talking about. Sherlock snaps his head back towards me.

“Progress?” he asks.

“With the case.”

“Which case, John?”

“Sherlock, Jesus.”

“What, Mary? John isn’t making this easy on me. Why should I make it easy on him? We’re not here to talk about my bloody cases.” Sherlock’s voice is waspish.

“What, exactly, are we here to talk about?” I ask, unable to keep the tension out of my voice. “Are we here to talk about the fact that you’ve made Mary cry recently? Or the fact that-”

“Wrong.”

“Wrong what, Sherlock? I _know_ she’s been crying, goddamn it.”

“Obviously she’s been crying,” Sherlock says, rolling his eyes.

“Next you’ll be telling me I made her cry,” I growl quietly, my left hand flexing and unfurling. I can’t stop it, and it infuriates me.

“Wrong again, John. We. _We_ made her cry.”

“I wasn’t even there, Sherlock.” I say, crossing my arms and pursing my lips. I can’t believe the nerve.

“No, you, rubbish fiance that you are, elected to ignore your woman and me in favor of cupping men’s testicles and ordering them to cough.”

“Sherlock, for God’s sake, you _promised_!” Mary’s glaring daggers at Sherlock, and I feel marginally better. For a bit it seemed alarmingly like she was taking his part.

“I only promised you that I wouldn’t be insufferable, Mary. I’m not. I’m stating facts. Is it or is it not true that you were crying because John was not at the flat this afternoon?”

“Mary would not be crying because I was at my sodding _job_ , Sherlock. A job that I need more so now than ever since I’ve apparently been fired from my moonlighting position as a goddamn doormat. But that’s ok. Being your doormat never paid anyway.” Mary’s now glaring at me. I struggle not to roll my eyes. This entire dinner is a mistake. Maybe after we’re done...doing whatever it is we’ll end up doing here, she’ll just let it lie.

“So, John, you’re claiming that, if not for your job, such as it is, you would have popped on by Baker Street and fulfilled your position of doormat?”

He’s got me there. There is no chance that I would have gone over to the flat or even that I’d be sitting here if it weren’t for Mary’s insistence. I just glare across the table, hoping that’s answer enough.

“This was a mistake. It’s too soon or...something,” Mary mutters. “I’ve lost my appetite. I’ll see you at home, John. _Don’t_ rush.”

It’s as close to being ordered out of our flat that I’ve ever come and it hurts. I sit there, watching her leave, feeling like I have failed at something important. It always manages to be my fault. Across from me, Sherlock sighs.

“Just go, John,” he says, his voice resigned. He’s scrubbing at his eyes with his fingers. He sounds tired. “You’ve already made up your mind about this. Try not to make it so hard on her.”

“Dear God, did Sherlock Holmes just give me relationship advice?” I ask leaning across the table and glaring at him. “I think that sudden chill was hell freezing over.”

“John!” Angelo bellows from across the restaurant. “Out the window!”

Sherlock’s already leaping to his feet as I see Mary struggling with two men just down the road. I see a flash of something metallic close to her neck as I turn from the window, hard on Sherlock’s heels as we race towards the door.

As we blow through the door, Mary goes horrifyingly limp and is manhandled into a waiting van, which peels away.

People. There are too many people in the way, having hurried forward to help, but not fast enough. They block our progress, and Sherlock curses loudly and elaborately.

“Fuck, Sherlock!” I yell as I catch up with him. He’s pounding furiously at his phone. “Mind Palace!” I yell, and he spins towards me, his phone up to his ear.

“Mycroft! CCTV at Corner of Northumberland and Craven Passage! I need you to follow a black Ford van. Mary’s been abducted! DON’T ASK QUESTIONS, FUCKING _DO_ IT!” he roars and listens for a moment intently before streaking away to the left, phone still held tight against his ear.

“Fuck,” I mutter as I sprint after him, almost losing him as he makes a quick turn down an alley. By the time I catch sight of him, he’s pocketed his phone and is running as fast as he can, pulling away from me with long strides. I turn the next corner just in time to see him throw himself bodily onto the  bonnet of a black van which screeches to a halt as he bashes up into the windshield, shattering it.

I don’t stop till I slam up against the door, yanking it open. It’s empty, except for the driver. My phone buzzes.

“Who?” I gasp, frantic.

“They switched cars at the last intersection. If my brother would have stayed on the phone--”

“ _Where_ , Mycroft?” I shout, not interested in placing blame at this point.

“Off grid.”

“There’s an off grid?”

“Of course. The angles of some buildings obscure--” I ring off, cursing and kicking the truck repeatedly. The driver looks terrified out of his mind. Wrong van too. I look up and Sherlock is slouching against a light post, gasping and coughing wetly. He raises his gaze and covers his mouth with his hand.

“Sorry,” he gasps out as he slumps to the ground, clutching at his side under his coat. I move towards him but he shakes his head. “Just transport, John.  Let me think.”

I nod, but crouch down close anyway, not touching him but trying to ascertain the damage. He’s already shut his eyes against the world, but I can’t tell if he’s thinking or losing consciousness.

I feel a hand grasp my shoulder, and it’s Lestrade. I realize neither Sherlock nor I have moved in...how long? I'm still reeling from the suddenness of it.

“What’s going on?” Lestrade’s asking, intent. I focus briefly on a woman standing behind him, glaring at us.

“Across from Angelo’s. Mary was abducted,” I say, and Lestrade curses and yanks out his phone. He barks out a few orders and hangs up.

I feel intensely confused. How did Lestrade know we were here but no details? Sherlock’s levering himself upright, using the lamp post as support. He staggers slightly to the side, his face hidden in shadow.

“Gregory, running out of dinner for...this…” The woman says, gesturing wildly at us. “It’s exactly the sort of thing I was talking about.” Understanding dawns on me.

This is a coincidence. Lestrade’s dressed in a far nicer suit than his usual fare, and the woman behind him...it must be his wife. They were at dinner. He must have seen Sherlock dive in front of the van.

Before Lestrade can answer his mobile chimes, and he holds it to his ear, thrusting out one hand in an appeal for silence, and the woman presses her lips together glaring at the sky.

“Sorry for interrupting,” I manage, staring around me, wondering what the fuck I can do to get us back on the right track.

The woman snaps her glare to me, and her eyes widen in recognition. “I know you,” she accuses. “You’re John Watson. You write that ridiculous blog.”

I stare at her dumbly. Lestrade has a hand over the ear not covered by his phone and is obviously struggling to understand whatever is being said on the line. I need to be doing something… I turn away from her.

“Sherlock?” I ask, hoping that he’s been able to figure something out. He’s still slumping against the light, and hasn’t said anything and it occurs to me that this is a bit not good.

“Sherlock? Sherlock Holmes?” the woman is suddenly right next to me, crowding me out of the way. “So you’re the famous Sherlock bloody Holmes who nearly cost Gregory his job along with everything else. What in hell did you think you were playing at by faking your own death you stupid, selfish--”

“Really? You’re really going to harangue a man who has just been hit by a car?” I ask, planting myself between her and Sherlock. “Did you not hear what I said to Greg? A woman’s just been kidnapped and you’re going to-- You need to stop. Now. And back away. Go -- Go back to dinner.”

Sherlock hisses something behind me, and I turn back to him.

“Shit,” I say as he starts sliding down the pole. I pull back his coat as he sits on the ground, and feel down his torso.

“Idiot,” I mutter. “You’ve broken at least two ribs...Can you breathe? We need to get you to hospital.”

He shakes his head. “I can breathe fine, John.” He winces as he takes a lungful of air to prove it.

I feel my phone buzz. Looking down I see a text from a blocked number. I motion for Greg and he crouches down next to sherlock and I hold the phone out opening it where we can all see it.

Save souls Now!

Mary or James Morstan!

 

Another text comes through as we watch

 

Saint or Sinner?

James or John?

The more is less?

 

Sherlock squeezes his eyes shut for a minute. I wait tensely until they fly open, wide with understanding.

“Skip code! St. James the Less --  the church. Lestrade we need to get there _now_.” he gasps, reaching up. I take his hand and help him get to his feet and he throws an arm around my shoulders for support as he sways forward.

“Did you hit your head too?” I ask incredulously.

“No John, I’m fine. Winded. Lestrade, get us over there!” he shouts. Lestrade’s already  motioning us over to a parked car.

“Gregory,” his wife protests as he slaps the magnetic light to the top of his car.

“Get in or go home, Karen. This is an emergency,” he grinds out. She looks torn for a moment until I open the rear door and Sherlock gets in, glaring at her until she turns away, heels clicking against the concrete.

I run around the the side of the car and slide in, only just closing the door as Lestrade peels off. 


	10. Chapter 10

A&E was closer, in the end, than Barts. I look over at Sherlock, who is leaning back on the seat next to mine, his fingers steepled in front of his lips, his eyes pressed shut. His shirt hangs open and the bandages wrapped tightly around his chest blend in almost perfectly with skin that hasn’t seen sunlight maybe ever.

His hands, like mine, are bandaged. We both sustained first degree burns pulling Mary from the middle of the bonfire as it blossomed into flame. I flex my fingers, feeling the stiffness, knowing that will translate into pain as the drugs wear off.  Sherlock must be in some agony, having wisely refused any, but you wouldn’t know it to look at his face.

I let my gaze wander again over Mary. Her hair has been badly singed. She’ll bitch later, I suppose, about needing to restyle it to compensate. I squeeze my eyes shut tightly for a moment, fighting tears, so goddamn grateful that I’ll have the chance to hear her complain.

Thanks to Sherlock.

He had seen the clue in the text, hidden in a skip code, that I never would have figured out in time, if at all.

We’d had seconds...if Greg hadn’t pulled down the one way alley as Sherlock demanded or we hadn’t barreled down the shallow stairs instead of following the driveway, we would have been too late. I can feel my heart rate ramping up as I realize just how close it had been. I’m sure that the images of flames billowing upwards towards the effigy of Guy Fawkes and the actinic smell of lighter fluid will add terrible variety to my future nightmares.

And Sherlock…

He must have doused that Belstaff in flame retardant at some point, because as far as I can tell, it’s still fairly undamaged. Any self respecting coat, even a woolen one, should be signed after what he put it through.

He had been first out of the car and had pushed violently through the hedge, the crowd of people and the burning pallets and wood debris that formed the bonfire, plunging into it the heart of the blaze and grabbing Mary as I’d come up behind him. She had snagged on something and it had taken several moments before we could pull her free.

Flames had replaced the air we had displaced as we tugged at her. They had licked up our hands and arms. I can still see fire curling like corona around Sherlock’s head, but I don’t remember feeling the pain until later. Greg’d been right behind us and had a pocket knife ready to cut the zip ties that held Mary’s hands together behind her back. She had not regained consciousness.

I flex my fingers again. When I open my eyes, I realize Sherlock is staring at me. He’s breathing hard. His pupils are dilated and his nostrils flare.

“What is it?” I rasp quietly, inclining towards him so he won’t have to speak loudly. It hurts to talk. He leans away from me, his eyes widening fractionally as he glances quickly between me and Mary, his eyes lingering over the cut on her brow, the burns on her leg.

“She’ll be ok, Sherlock. Probably a lot better off than us, actually,” I say quietly. He nods once, sharply, but I get the distinct impression he’s not really hearing what I’m saying. I sigh and try again. “It was close, but--”

“ _Why Mary_?” he snarls quietly.

I shut the hell up. I have no idea ‘why Mary.’ I suspect  many things, but I don’t know any of them.

“Has she ever told you--”

“No, Sherlock, and if she had, I wouldn’t tell you. It’s her secret to tell. Imagine I said that without sounding like an ass.  I’m sorry, it’s just -- so much,” I stammer, scrubbing my eyes with my fingers before I realize just how stupid that is.

“John, I’m sorry,” Sherlock says, his voice husky from the smoke, and as deep as ever. I nod, unwilling to open my eyes.

“It’s not your fault. Not sure why this happened, but I’m sure you’ll figure it out. In fact if you hadn’t--”

“No, John, you’re not listening. I’m sorry. About everything. I apologize.”

I hold my eyes closed for a bit longer.

“You were gone,” I said quietly. “It hurt so… I’m rubbish at this. You can’t-- You don’t know. I went there. I talked to you. I don’t even know who I was talking to now.”

“You asked me to not be dead,” Sherlock deadpans, and I snap my eyes up.

“You were there?” I whisper. His face is an impassive mask, but I can see the current running beneath, deep and churning. Frantic. I can almost see fire wreathing his face again, seeming to fly from his mouth as he screamed Mary’s name.

“Everything I did for two years, I did so that I could return without endangering you,” he says, refusing look away from me. “Everything I...experienced. I did it so that I could come home.” 

“And you did come home, and I wasn’t there,” I muttered, realizing that Mary has been right, these past few weeks. I’ve been a right bastard. “But I didn’t know Sherlock. If you had contacted me...If you had-- one word. One word is all I would have needed!” I struggle to keep my voice down.

“Think about it, though,” he says, and unaccountably his voice is lighter. “If you had found me, you wouldn't have found Mary. I like her.”

“I wouldn’t trade her for anything,” I say, unable to keep a smile from my face as I follow the line of his gaze with mine, regarding her singed hair, her cut face, smoke-blackened clothes, the sublimely beautiful rise and fall of her chest.

“Thank you,” I say softly.

“Of course, John.”

I still feel the little twist of anger lodged in my chest, but for the first time in weeks, I fancy I can feel it loosen a bit. Warm a bit.

“Between this and whatever Mycroft hauled you back for, you’ve got your work cut out for you,” I say, noncommittal.

“London is in danger, John,” Sherlock answers seriously. I feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand to attention. “There’s an imminent terrorist attack and I need your help.”

“My help?” I ask, shooting for incredulous and managing breathless. “Do you think this-- terrorist thing has anything to do with…” I drift off, gesturing at Mary.

“I don’t know. Not enough data. Will you help me, John?” Sherlock asks.

I sit quietly for a moment, realizing that Sherlock is leaning forward slightly, completely intent on my answer.

 

 


	11. Chapter 11

“John,” I say smiling, knowing he’s there without even opening my eyes. He strokes my hair back, brushing his fingertips lightly against my scalp. It feels delicious and I tilt my head back against his fingers, inviting more. He makes me wish I could purr.

His expression, when I finally open my eyes is not when I expected. He looks nervous, and sheepish, as though he’s about to burst out in nervous laughter.

“Thought you were helping Sherlock?” I ask, stretching my arms over my head and arching till my back cracks. I sit up in the bed in his empty room at Baker Street and rub at the dressings on my wrists.

“Don’t do that,” John says automatically, softening his words with a smile and taking my hands in his. “How do you feel?” he asks.

I think about this, seriously assessing before I answer. When we’d left A&E, I’d still been woozy and disoriented. I’d had just enough wherewithal to understand that we were about to get into separate cabs and put up a stink. I’d ordered John into Sherlock’s cab and sat propped up between them, reminding them that they had work to do. John only acquiesced when I promised I would rest in his room. Apparently I hadn’t fought on that point.

Apparently I got up the stairs to this room without remembering how. I wonder if I’d been carried, and wonder who had carried me and find myself imagining how it would be to be carried up the stairs by Sherlock which focuses my attention right back on John _where it belongs_. John’s still looking embarrassed.

“I’m feeling fine, John. Not dizzy anymore. Why d’you look like you’ve just seen your parents fucking? Oh, no, you didn’t have another row?” I ask, exasperated. John looks more confused and then shakes his head laughing.

“No, we didn’t.” The smile fades slightly. “It’s not… it’s not okay yet. Not okay with him and me. But we’ve got work to do and I understand that this...this thing is a two-way street. I’m going to try.”

I nod, purposefully not squeezing bandaged hands.

“Anyway, I’m up here because I wanted to check on you and Mycroft came over.”

I am forced to laugh at the face he makes.

“ _Mycroft_ chased you out?” I crow. “It’s them that’s having the row then.” I listen carefully trying to catch what they might be fighting about. According to John they always row. John tucks his chin in and smiles slightly.

“That’s the strange thing. They’re not fighting. They’re...playing operation,” he says, struggling mightily not to laugh. I stare at him for a moment, then we burst out into a fit of giggles. I hold a hand to my forehead as pain blossoms behind my eyes, but it’s good, so good to giggle with John again, I’d suffer an aneurism for this.

There are steps on the stair and Mrs. Hudson comes in, tray laden with tea.

“Oh you two. Well I’m sure I don’t know... John giggling, Sherlock lecturing his brother about loneliness...what is the world coming to?” she asks. All we can manage is gasping laughter and she titters happily, setting the tray down and bustling down the stairs. Finally, I calm long enough to inhale the aroma of the tea. And another, less appealing odor.

“Cor, issat me?” I ask, sniffing audibly and wrinkling my nose, dredging up some of that cockney flavor that makes John wince and laugh at the same time.

“Smoked like a fine...scotch barrel.” John says, his eyes crinkling.

“Cuppa, then shower. Think there’s anything to wear? I don’t think I can make it home alone at the moment and you two have work to do…”

“I’ll find something. I wonder if he’s gone yet…” John opens the door and leans out, listening intently. “Yup, sounds like the coast is clear. Help yourself to the shower, Mary and feel free to make liberal use of His Nibs’ hair products. They are extremely expensive,” he says with a wink, and he’s gone.

I finish my cup of coffee thinking hard about what’s just happened. Try as I can, I cannot link my abduction with the terrorist thing they’re dealing with right now. That does not, however, mean there is not a connection, only that I don’t see it. I sigh. Things like this are rarely a coincidence. I know what I need to do, but it’s going to be so incredibly hard. I can, at least, afford a bath first. Maybe if I’m clean and I smell nice, I won’t be as...hateful.

I dig around in my bag and pull out a rather large thumbdrive and twirl it between my knuckles. I toss it up and catch it, gently easing my legs over the bed. I’m not badly burned, thanks to my boys, but moving still hurts. I deal with the pain, considering it practice for later.

                                                                                                               ~~~

 

When I come out of the shower wearing what John informs me is Sherlock’s second best housecoat, they’re glued to a laptop Skyping with a man in a Chullo, underground maps and reference books spread out over the entire table. Sherlock is pacing back and forth with his eyes shut and John is positively radiating energy. Seriously, he could light London for a week. It’s beautiful.  

I feel like I’m looking through a window seeing all the things that he wouldn’t talk about when Sherlock was gone. The heady mix of mystery, danger, adrenaline and something ineffably Sherlock is overwhelming. My heart starts beating faster in sympathy, and I’m overwhelmed by envy.

“Moran didn’t disappear – the entire Tube compartment did. The driver must have diverted the train and then detached the last carriage,” Sherlock growls, clearly frustrated

“Detached it where?! You said there was nothing between those stations,” John answers, cocking his eye at the Chullo and gesturing at the maps surrounding him.

“Not on the maps, but once you eliminate all the other factors, the only thing remaining must be the truth,” Sherlock says stubbornly. It sounds like a rote recital...something he often has to remind himself often.  That carriage vanished, so it must be somewhere.”

“But why, though? Why detach it in the first place?” The Churro says, looking across the mess of material in front of him. Honestly, Sherlock and John have the oddest assistants.

“It vanishes between St James’s Park and Westminster. Lord Moran vanishes. You’re kidnapped and nearly burned to death at a fireworks par…” Sherlock gestures at me. I hadn’t even realized he knew I was in the room.

“Oh...” I breathe. He narrows his eyes. “John, what’s the date?” I ask. He thinks for a second.

“Hmm? November the ... My God.” His mouth drops open.

Sherlock’s eyes widen. “Lord Moran – he’s a peer of the realm. Normally he’d sit in the House. Tonight there’s an all-night sitting to vote on the new anti-terrorism Bill. But he won’t be there. Not tonight. Not the fifth of November.”

“Remember, remember,” I murmur.

“Gunpowder, treason, and plot,” Sherlock finishes his grin positively feral.

“So now we know who, but we still don’t know where or how,” John says, running his fingers through his hair in frustration.

“Wrong, John,” Sherlock says. “We know there’s a carriage somewhere underground between Westminster and St. James’s Park Station. Find the carriage, solve the crime,” he snaps. “Do keep up.”

“Look,” I say, pulling a book from in front of John. “This whole area is a big mess of old and new stuff. Charing Cross is made up of bits of older stations like Trafalgar Square, Strand …”

“No, Mary, it’s none of those. We’ve accounted for those,” Sherlock says, peering closer at a map in front of him. “St Margaret’s Street, Bridge Street, Sumatra Road, Parliament Street …”

“Hang on, hang on,” the Chullo interrupts from the monitor.  “Sumatra Road. You mentioned Sumatra Road, Mr Holmes. There is something. I knew it rang a bell. There was a station down there.”

“Well, why isn’t it on the maps?” I ask, frowning.

“‘Cause it was closed before it ever opened. They built the platforms, even the staircases, but it all got tied up in legal disputes, so they never built the station on the surface.” He holds up a map to his screen camera pointing out the appropriate area.

“It’s right underneath the Palace of Westminster,” Sherlock murmurs.

“And so what’s down there? A bomb?” John asks absently. I gasp and Sherlock bolts for the door.

“Oh!” John says, leaping to his feet. He almost trips over his feet as he turns back to me, his expression reflecting how torn he is.

I get up and push him towards the door, limping slightly.

“Go, go!” I shout. Sherlock looks back from the door and studies my face for half a second.

“Next time, Mary,” he says, tossing a grin like a dagger over his shoulder as he disappears into the stairwell. I laugh as John runs after him, wondering just how transparent  I am to Sherlock.

I shake my head, hearing the front door slam and limp over to the window to watch Sherlock bring a cab to a screeching halt. A brief vision of the havoc he’d wreak in a crowded New York intersection makes me smile as I turn away from the window, back to kitchen to put on some tea.

Chullo’s still on Skype. He startles as I come back into the camera view.

“What’s that about?” he asks.

“Nothing much,” I say, “bomb possibly blowing up parliament. Par for the course for Sherlock, it seems.”

Chullo’s eyes widen fractionally.

“Should we phone the police?” he says, his voice shaking.

“Best not to worry. Signing off now,” I say and kill the program.

I absently fill the kettle, considering recent events. Apparently my abduction wasn’t part of this particular plot. This realization is more unsettling than anything. I would have much preferred to wrap up this whole sorry affair at once.

As it is, I seem to have an enemy out there who I know nothing about. I finger the thumb drive in the pocket of Sherlock’s robe, planning on how and when to ask for their help, and feel my heart flutter with fear. I can’t… I can’t lose John. How can I do this without losing him? He has no idea what I am. Sherlock, for all of his eccentricity, is on the side of the angels.

As my tea brews, I run a mental talley, breaking down every mark I’ve taken, lining up forgivable sins against those which defy forgiveness. In the end, there’s only one, I decide. Only one sin that John would never forgive, only one thing he’d actually leave me for.

I pull John’s laptop over to me and figure out his password. It takes me all of three minutes and I smile fondly when I come up with it. I pop the thumb drive in and wait for it to load. Forty two files. Forty two sins, ordered neatly by date. I highlight the second and, after a moment’s hesitation, I delete it. If only I could delete it from my memory so easily.  I remove the thumb drive and shut the laptop. I sit back and sip my tea and wait for the boys to come home.

 

 


	12. Chapter 12

Moran, Rat Number One in a tube...incongruous. Disappeared. Gone between one frame and another, took a whole section of a train with him.  Where did he go? Has to have gone somewhere. Not enough data. Not impossible only improbable.

And improbable works! Improbable is _brilliant_.  Improbable is John’s saying something and he’s actually sitting there at the table, our table comparing notes with our Chullo-wearing, surprisingly useful client.

As usual, nothing he’s saying is relevant or especially useful, but his there, _here_ , with me here, his _presence_ is catalytic.

I can think again, _really_ think, and it’s like water sliding down my parched throat, like heroin burning gorgeous through my veins. Like a train hurtling through a tunnel, but which tunnel, no tunnel, there is no other tunnel. John’s just repeated the obvious, he’s echoing my thoughts, he does that so often, no tunnel through which that carriage could disappear. Impossible, but not, the impossible carriage there is something I’m missing what am I missing?

Seven carriages out six in. Where? Where is the missing carriage? Where the hell did it go? It’s important, vitally important. Underground terrorist movement. Not hidden, but actually Underground it has to be linked to this fucking missing carriage.  

I close my eyes and run through the stops again. I can see them, doors open, doors close. Open and close, I can _see_ them and I know there’s no way no place for the carriage to lose itself between those two stops but it must have.  It did. I saw it, we saw it. It happened so it’s not impossible only improbable and I can smell her before I even see her. John’s given her my dressing gown, but it’s not the right one; it’s far too big, not nearly nice enough, the blue one would have matched her eyes better, and she’s here now. Thank God we were in time, and that’s as improbable as this goddamn carriage. Where the hell is it where did it go?

And why? Why make a carriage and a peer of the realm disappear. Ha, disappearing peer, that’s funny, is that funny? Where is he? Why did they detach the carriage? Why is any of this happening? Why now?

Back, back back up. Back up.

Mary.

Peer of the Realm disappears with a carriage. And Mary, you’re _almost burnt to death_ and I can see it screams and flames and burning wood around your face and your hair, I was almost too late and you were almost burnt to death at a fireworks--

She has it. She got there before I did which is just marvelous.   _Marvelous_. Of course I never know the date. I need to know the dates from now on, they’ll help me remember what day it is since it is so important. Now we have the why.

Where and how?

Not enough data, but we’re close, as close as Mary is to John pressed against his back what’s she looking at? A book, but we’ve looked through that book, the stations, no not those stations, but she’s talking through it imposing order and all this entropy recedes just a little, just enough to think of the stations we haven’t accounted for, the three that we haven’t. Sumatra, that’s interesting, why is that interesting? Something about Sumatra, Asia, Coffee, no, no, no,  Moran is in the pocket of the North Koreans, irrelevant, not even politically related, Sumatra, what is it with bloody Sumatra.

“...Closed before it ever opened…” The words hit like ice cubes in lava. Sumatra Road stop, of course, but why….Mary’s already there, the question on her lips, and of course it’s not on the maps, it wasn’t built on the street. It was a historical area because of the proximity to…

“The Palace of Westminster.” I’m halfway to the door when John finally gets it and he’s running to meet me, God, he really is going to _come_ and Mary’s pushing him, actually pushing and limping and if we had time, if she wasn’t so hurt (I’m going to kill whoever did that, maybe with my hands, maybe with her knives), it would be so perfect, so unbearably perfect, the both of them with me, but next time.

I shoot her a smile because there’s a bomb and life is _interesting_ and my ribs feel like fire and my chest hurts and John is here and she’ll be here when we get back. It matters, and I have no idea _why_ it matters so much that she’s here and wasn’t killed.  Knives, I’ll use the knives. If she’ll lend them to me.

There will _be_ a next time, if only I can get through to John and stop all his...whatever it is he has that isn’t him and is about what I did, but I’m bloody Sherlock fucking Holmes, and I know that I can solve John Watson if I could just get a bloody TAXI that would be a miracle. She’s in the window watching, and John’s right _here_ right behind me, and I swear I’ll jump on this cab’s hood and damn my ribs if he doesn’t -- Good. The bloody game is bloody well _on_.

 

 


	13. Chapter 13

In the cab, the rhythmic sound of the tyres on pavement help me focus.

This...this connective tissue between revelation and culmination is infuriating.  I figured out exactly what steps are necessary to find and defuse the bomb thirty seconds into our cab ride making the remaining fifteen minutes in heavy traffic almost  unbearable. I will distract myself with my next case: John Watson.

He sits next to me, not fidgeting but alert and inexplicably _ready_.  Phrases such as ‘Get ready’ or ‘Prepare yourself,’ are often vocalized by idiots who almost never have any idea for what they will be readying or preparing. Readiness and preparedness are not actions. They are states of being. One is ready or one is not. John is the living embodiment of this concept.  John Watson is _always_ ready. From the moment I came back into the flat the first day, he had been ready.

If only his inherent readiness extended to accepting necessity of  the circumstance surrounding my apparent death and subsequent reappearance. Seeing as though this is not the case, it is once again up to me to lead him, apparently kicking and screaming, toward the right conclusions.

We disembark from the cab and make enter the Underground through the Westminster Station entrance. It’s largely empty at this time of evening, and I have a harder time trying to dissuade John from calling the police than I do prying the gate to a service entrance open.

I am quite sure about what we’ll find on the Sumatra Road platform. Given Moran’s ties with North Korea, balance of probability has them organizing this and, according to Mycroft their methods and technology have never been especially difficult to deal with.  I’ve already alerted Lestrade with specific instructions not to arrive at the given coordinates for an hour, giving John and myself plenty of time to discover the carriage first and deal with the inevitable incendiary device we’ll find within.  Strong emotional stimuli have often pushed John into confronting things that are difficult for him. This will be yet another example.

We move down, further into the bowels of London, flashlights weaving dizzy patterns on the metal platforms and ladders as we approach the ghost station that doesn’t exist between St. James’ Place and Westminster Station. The platform is small when we come to it. It would have been as ridiculously crowded as the Baker Street platform had it been finished. There is a distinct lack of carriage.

“I don’t understand,” I admit.

“Well, that’s a first,” John mutters.

“There’s nowhere else it could be,” I state, refusing to rise to his bait.

Instead, I shut my eyes and visualize the explosion, ripping through the compartment. The flames billowing outwards and...upwards! A ventilation shaft, a steam tunnel, situated right below parliament, slightly to our left. South. “Oh!” I gasp, my eyes flying open.

I run off in the right direction overcoming John’s token protest at things like live rails. He follows without question.  He always does. I begin to understand that I do not know what I will do the day he flatly refuses. But then, that is precisely why I have made this gambit.

We make our way quickly but carefully down the tube until we pass below a large round ventilation shaft rising above us. It is covered in demolition charges. Why the demolition charges? Their presence makes me unaccountably uneasy.  They were not part of any of my preconceived situations. The carriage comes into view ahead of us just around the curve in the tunnel.

Getting in is not difficult. Upon entering, the nagging and unfamiliar sensation of doubt that had plagued me since the absence of the carriage at the platform balloons into the beginnings of panic.

The device I expected based on my assumptions about Moran is not there. The car appears perfectly normal.

“It’s empty. There’s nothing,” John comments.

My breath catches as I notice two innocuous looking wires running down the wall of the carriage behind a seat back.  

“Isn’t there?” I ask absently, and my skin crawls as I shift my flashlight so that I can gently pry up the seat cover. The canisters filled with bluish liquid that I find there confirm my growing suspicions.

I have badly miscalculated. I look over my shoulder and see John’s gaze fixated on the wired canisters in front of me.  

“This is the bomb. It’s not carrying explosives, the whole compartment is the bomb.” I can’t keep my voice from shaking.

Wrong, wrong _wrong_. None of this fits. This can't be happening.

All evidence to the contrary as John and I continue removing seat covers uncovering tube after tube of explosives. There is enough to demolish far more than parliament. I step on a loose floor plate and freeze momentarily, acutely aware that even the slightest friction of surfaces could end this whole sorry farce long before I can make my point to John, if that’s even possible now.

I bend down and slowly, carefully remove a floor panel. I feel my heart freeze in my chest. The high-tech device bracketed under the panel is like nothing I’ve ever dealt with.

I stand to the side quickly trying to put distance between myself and that softly-glowing instrument of death that I’ve led us right on top of.

“We need bomb disposal,” John says, after taking a few deep breaths, his voice deepened by carefully controlled panic.

I recognize that voice. I’ve heard it before, echoing off tiles and water. My heart suddenly jackhammers in my chest, my pulse ratcheting up with every beat.

“There may not be time for that now,” I tell him. I can’t tear my eyes away from this thing, this hateful thing that is so completely outside my huge realm of understanding. I swear, if we get out of this I am going to force Lestrade to allow me to shadow his bomb squad. I will learn every single thing that there ever was to learn about bombs and defusing them.  Only let me out, let us out and I will do this thing I promise…

“So what do we do?” John asks, staring.

“I have no idea,” I say, simply stating the truth, and disgust at my total ignorance wars briefly with the panic blossoming in my chest for a moment before it is consumed.  

“Well _think_ of something,” John says, expectant, calmly moving onto the next steps he seems sure that I have knowledge of.

“Why do you think I know what to do?” I ask, and I am serious, dead serious. _Why_ does he always think that I have the solution to everything? No one else does, just him, only him.  

“Because you’re Sherlock Holmes. You’re as clever as it gets!” he says, glaring at me as if I’m Kitty Riley, angry at me for doubting myself.

“That doesn’t mean I know how to defuse a giant bomb. What about you?” I ask, a sudden shaft of hope piercing through the panic. Since I’ve known him, every single time I didn’t have the answer, he did, or he supplied means with which to find it. That is a crucial piece of this puzzle. John’s here. We may yet get out of this.

“I wasn’t in bomb disposal. I’m a bloody doctor!” he snarls.

“And a _soldier_ as you keep reminding us all,” I snap, turning my attention back to the bomb, the tiny sparkle of hope fading, replaced by a darkening miasma of anger and panic and I can’t focus, I can’t make any sense out of this situation. It’s _wrong. I’m_ wrong.

“Can’t...can’t we rip that timer off or something?” John asks weakly.

“No, that would set it off,” I say reflexively.

“See, you know things!” He shouts.  

I turn away, sickened by the desperation in his voice. It’s too much, knowing that he thinks I know how to deal with this. I don’t. I have no idea no idea at all. God, my ribs hurt, my chest hurts, my heart hurts, I feel as though I’m pumping lead through my veins rather than blood, I am failing, I am failing us. I was so sure, _so very sure_ what we would find here and I am as wrong as I have ever been when it counts the most.

The lights snap on and the automatic door locks clamp shut, causing both of us to jump, startled and terrified like fucking rabbits. Power surges through the compartment and, in front of our eyes, the timer begins its countdown.

My mind reels, and I pace, scrubbing my face, trying to breathe past the plug of concrete that has lodged itself in my esophagus. Despair. That's what this is. It's like nothing I've ever felt, like thorny vines constricting my lungs.

John’s shouting something about not having called the police, but of course, I _have_ called them. They’re on their way and, _as per my instructions_ , they are due to arrive exactly seven and a half minutes after John and I will be twisting in flame, burning like sacrifices to my damnable hubris. It’s my fault, it’s my fault.

“Go!” I say, knowing it’s pointless, but I deserve this, I deserve to die alone for what I have done, and he deserves to die fighting for the life he would have had if I had just had the grace to _stay dead_.

“There’s no point now, is there, because there’s no time to get away, and if we don’t do this other people will _die_!” he screams at me. As though it matters what other people do. One life. I would sacrifice every man woman and child above us for one life!

“Mind palace,” he says. “Use your mind palace!”

“How will that help?” I ask desperately. There is nothing of value, nothing of use there, it’s dark and it’ll be raining and he’ll be wandering the halls.

“You’ve sorted away every fact under the SUN!”

“Oh what and you think I’ve just got ‘how to defuse a bomb’ just tucked away in there?” I scream.

“YES!”

Actually…

“Maybe,” I say and I close my eyes, sorting and sifting-- racing down dark hallways.

It’s not the bomb. I know I don’t have how to pick apart a bomb of this complexity stored away. But something, something….Something I read when I was researching the type of IED that the IRA were using when they...it was delayed… only to go off if the vote switched the switch. _switch_. SWITCH. Where? What kind? I can see it, I can see the picture in the journal, it was a pipe bomb.

Blackness hazes over my mind and I lose the picture, loose everything. Lose my mind. It was a pipe bomb, not like this not complex, professional but low tech not the same not the same, information as useless as the heliocentric theory that, thanks to John, I will never be able to delete again, and he was right then too, he was always right, always good, he kept me right, and I have killed him as sure as if I had led him to the sniper’s muzzle, and it’s over.

I shout and my hands spasm as I realize that I have nothing nothing _nothing_. The look the look on his face, the defeat there I have never seen it before, and it’s my fault, he’s turning away, disgusted, of course he is.  

It’s worse than Moriarty because this time it’s true, I have nothing, I am the fraud, the joke that they claimed. I succeed just enough to fail utterly.  I am nothing in the face of this and he will die because of it and Mary will be alone and it is my fault and I’m choking, literally choking, so I pull my scarf away and fall to my knees because there is nothing else to do.

The timer, inches below my eyes counts down the precious moments, the seconds that John has left to continue the rapid inhalation and exhalation of breath the systole and diastole that pumps the blood through his veins that I gave my own to protect, and it’s for nothing, and he has never forgiven me, and I will die having harmed him again. My hands fly over the machine, seeking anything something, blindly groping, feeling for what I know isn’t there.

“My God,” John says softly.

I can’t stand it, I’m gasping for the pain of it when my finger touches something, something that cannot be there. Something that makes no sense at all. I flick the imaginary, impossible switch because there is no way, just no way that something that doesn’t exist can negatively affect this situation and yet, before my eyes, the timer stops at one minute and twenty-nine seconds, and I know.

I know that I am going to do one last awful thing to him.

On our first case John reminded me that he had come nearer to death than I ever had and at the time, privately, I had begrudged him that privilege-- the privilege of being forced to condense the essence of your entire life into one thought, one cohesive plea. In the moments before his death, John had prayed to God to keep on living.

I’ve never believed  in God, though I use his name as an expletive quite effectively, so I will ask the person who comes closest to filling that place in my life for the only thing that apparently matters to me.

“I’m sorry,” I say, looking up from the ground. I’m already in a pose of supplication, quite appropriate.

“What?”

“I’m sorry,” I continue, knowing that he’s going to hear me and that he won’t understand, but I need to say it. “I can’t do it, John. I don’t know how.” His expression confirms it-- he thinks I’m talking about the bomb. He can’t understand that it’s my life I’m talking about. I don’t know how to live without… I can’t. I can’t.

“Forgive me,” I find myself folding my hands in front of me and, to my utter disgust, I feel tears burning in my eyes.

“What?” he spits, and my heart seizes.

“Please, John, forgive me for all the hurt that I’ve caused you,” I say, and my voice catches.

“No no no no no no,” his half smile is distinctly at odds with his panic-deep voice. “This is a trick.

“No,” I shake my head. How does he know?

“This is another one of your bloody tricks.”

“No,”

“You’re trying to make me to say something nice.” He’s actually almost smiling now, and I falter myself, because John’s smile has always brought a sympathetic one to my lips.

“Not this time.” I say.

“This is to make you look good even though you behaved…” He clenches his jaw and turns away, his face a mask of anger and hurt.

I’m walking barefoot on a knife’s edge.  John thinks he is about to die. Whatever comes out of his mouth will be truth, irrevocable, and it terrifies me because I can’t go back to the way things were. Mary was right. I do not understand feelings I have for John. They’re as foreign and as dangerous to me as the bomb I’ve just defused. But I will force Lestrade to teach me about bombs, and I will beg Mary to teach me about...this. Just please, _please_.

“ _I wanted you not to be dead,_ ” he hisses. I can’t meet his eyes. I feel like I’m sliding down the knife the wrong way-- I’ve pushed him too far.

“Yeah, well, be careful what you wish for,” I say and he turns away. “If I hadn’t come back, you wouldn't be standing there...you’d still have a future with Mary,”

“Yeah, I know,” he says, whipping back around, pointing at me, furious. I can’t blame him. I can’t, but it still breaks something in me that I didn’t even know I had.

“Look, I find it difficult-- I find it difficult, this sorta stuff,” he grinds out.

“I know,” I say, feeling the knife twist. I can almost welcome the pain because he’s still here, still talking. It won’t last much longer.

“You were the best and the wisest man that I have ever known.” he says.

I look up, needing confirmation from his expression that my ears have not deceived me. His eyes fierce and determined. He wants to make sure I understand.

“God, yes, of course. I forgive you.” are John’s last words before he closes his eyes and breathes in for the last time, bracing for the death I’ve stalled.

As a child, I was obsessed with the idea of vampirism for three and a half weeks, not because I was enamored of their physical prowess or their beauty or immorality, but because I couldn’t stop thinking about the moment of transition, the moment at which one was infused with new life at the cusp of death.  I used to think it must have felt like pushing off. Now I know for a fact that heroin _pales_ in comparison to this.

Giddy relief bubbles up through my chest and I clamp a hand over my mouth to stifle the hysterical laughter at least until I can control it enough to transform it into something more...dignified. It doesn’t work. I think he thinks I’m crying until he gets a good look at my face.

I would be worried that he would stay angry at me for fooling him just now, but he’d just forgiven me for faking my own death so that would be irrational.

“I’m going to kill you,” he growls.

“Oh please. Killing me was so two years ago.” I say, daring to grin. His answering smile teaches me all I need to know about redemption.

Hours later, after debriefing Lestrade, we got home. Mary will be waiting.


	14. Chapter 14

As soon as John and Sherlock walk through the door, I know something has changed. He's grinning and Sherlock-- Sherlock is positively glowing. Radiating happiness even though he’s currently scowling at me.

“Mary, all this time and you’re still loitering away in my dressing gown,” he admonishes, swinging his coat from his shoulders and tossing it on the couch. I grin at him as John envelops me in a bear hug kissing me soundly.

“You’re never going to believe what this utter wanker put me through.” he says, swinging me around in a circle.

I chuckle, raising an eyebrow at Sherlock over John’s shoulder. “Try me,” I say, and Sherlock has the decency to groan elaborately as he makes his way to the kitchen.

“You can’t hold that against me anymore, Mary. John’s officially forgiven me. By default, so must you.”

“According to whose rules?” I demand, laughing.

“Mine of course,” Sherlock shoots back, entering his room.

“Mary, would you mind staying here one more night?” John asks as soon as Sherlock is out of earshot. “This is going to be all over the news tomorrow. He’ll have to talk to them and--”

“And you want your bit of the limelight,” I smirk, tweaking his nose. Before he can protest, I wrap my arms around him and lean against him, tucking my head right where it fits under his chin. “We can stay on two conditions,” I state and I feel his chuckle reverberate through his chest more than I hear it. “First condition is that you to out before everything starts and get me some clothing. Second condition is that you tell me all about whatever it is that just happened between you two. In detail.”

His hands, which have been rubbing light circles over my shoulders still and I wonder if I’ve made a mistake.

“I’ll tell you everything, Mary. I will, but I need some time.” His voice is suddenly raw and tired.

“Whenever, love,” I say softly. “Just tell me what you need.”

There’s long silence and I pull back to look at his face. He’s gazing down at me intently, considering. “I need you, Mary.” He says softly. “Forever. With me. Just like this.”

My breath catches in my throat. Something did indeed happen. “John,” I whisper, reaching up and cupping his jaw.

“I don’t have...I don’t have a…ring or anything. Just now. I don’t-- That is to say that I’m not ready, but,” He stops and bites his lower lip. I find it’s hard to catch my breath, the look in his eyes-- He stares at me for a moment, then tucks his chin in and rushes into the breach.

“I love you, obviously, and I realized today, just this evening in fact, that Sherlock is back and everything, _everything in my life_ would be complete if you’d tell me you’d be my wife.”

There are tears spilling down my cheeks, I can’t help it.

“Of course, John. Of course,” I whisper, and he pulls me closer and kisses me, and it’s perfect even though I’m standing barefoot in Sherlock’s dressing gown kissing a man who smells of steam tunnel and sweat. It is just perfect.

John stiffens fractionally at a polite cough from behind us. Sherlock’s standing in the kitchen having already changed into lounge pants and a blue dressing gown.

“I see congratulations are in order,” he says, cocking an eyebrow at us, the corners of his lips tucking upwards. John’s shoulders relax at the lightness in his voice. “Had I some warning, I would be offering you champagne instead of tea. However, seeing as though I’ve never made tea when John was physically in the flat, the uniqueness of the gesture should outweigh the mundanity of the result.”

I smile, wrinkling my nose at him, cocking my eye at their liquor cabinet.

“Or,” he rumbles, smiling properly, “we can break into something a bit stronger.” I giggle against John as he laughs, swinging me around towards him.

“Scotch, please, and get a double for Mary. You’ll have to get her good and pissed before you tell her the mess you almost made out of 10 blocks of London, you daft git,” he says breaking away from me to shake Sherlock’s outstretched hand, surprising him by pulling him into a quick hug.

I giggle at the expression on Sherlock’s face before grabbing him for a hug of my own.

“You’ll have to forgive me, Your Nibs” I say as I squeeze him around the waist, feeling him awkwardly return the embrace. “I’ve been a bad influence. I’ve turned John into rather a hugger while you were away.”

I settle John down in his chair and take a place on the floor, leaning back comfortably against his knees. Sherlock comes back with our drinks and frowns.

“We’ll need another chair,” he says, handing John his drink, and somehow inexplicably, that simple statement almost brings tears to my eyes. Sherlock notes my expression and smirks, but his eyes are warm. “Honestly, second best dressing gown, making you sit at his feet, it’s a wonder you’ve agreed to marry him at all Mary. An absolute wonder,” he snipes, turning to the fireplace. There are already logs laid on and he sets his drink on the mantle while he goes about setting fire to them. Somehow, I’m sure that setting fire to things in this flat is solely Sherlock’s purview.

I laugh as John sputters through his first sip of the excellent scotch. “There’s something about him that makes us put up with his abuse, though, isn’t there?” I answer, and Sherlock cocks an eyebrow at me over his shoulder.

“I put up with him because no one else will put up with me. What’s your excuse?”

“If I tell him it’s your prowess in the sack, do I get a bigger diamond?” I ask John, and he giggles as Sherlock drops the poker he’s holding. The fire crackles to life and Sherlock takes his seat, staring at us like we’re trophies on his wall or something.

“So, tell me about this case, then,” I say and lean back against John’s legs as Sherlock’s gorgeous voice proceeds to do just that. His words fade into the background a bit as he goes over the parts I already know and I consider us three, sitting here against all odds.

It won’t always be like this. For people like us, there are always problems, and they’re not just the “you misplaced the tea again,” kind of problems. There will be violence, and anger and hate and turmoil, but as I sit here, warmed by the flickering fire, the flat wraps around us like a shock blanket, and I know it’s just the first of many nights that will make all that other shite worth every moment. 


	15. Chapter 15

“Can you sit down? For just a second.”

“Fine.”

“Ok, Sherlock, let me rephrase that: Can you sit down for just a second and remain seated for approximately ten minutes?”

“I don’t understand the preoccupation with sitting and talking. I’m a genius. I can talk and pace at the same time. Ask John.”

“I will as soon as he gets here which is in approximately nine minutes, and I need to tell you something first. It’s a _secret_ and I won’t tell you until you sit down and listen. Thank you.”

“Does this have to do with your past? You said you were going to let me deduce it!”

“You’re taking too long.”

“Please excuse me for not putting the puzzle of your past above two murders, a child pornographer and a closed room theft!”

“Well, I have a case for you now. Listen, this isn’t easy for me so just don’t say anything until I’m through, just, um, nod.

“I’m fairly sure you’ve figured out that I worked for the CIA, yeah? Ok. I’m sure you know that, under certain circumstance, parts of the CIA operate with a...certain operational flexibility...”

“Assassin! I was right. That very first night, I was right!

“But it’s not just that, is it, Mary? It’s not just your job or your former employer, no, John won’t have a lasting problem with that, nothing he couldn’t get over and you know that...one of your marks then. You killed someone that he’d never forgive you for. And now someone is threatening to expose you, or coming for vengeance. Oh, this could be grand. This could be really great. Mary, Mary, quite contrary, which way does your gun smoke blow. Ow!”

“This isn’t a sodding joke, you insufferable _bastard_! Sit down and--”  

“Of course it isn’t a joke. Jokes are dull. This is _brilliant_. It’s the chance I’ve been waiting for! And it concerns the Secret! Oh, this is Christmas. This is birthdays. This is…a knife. Apparently.”

“And I will cut out your tongue out with it if you don’t protect it valiantly behind a wall of teeth and lips. This isn’t a game. We are all in danger.”

“Mary, danger’s what we eat and dr--”

“Magnussen. Ah, that got your attention. He...has information that I would rather not...John can’t know. I don’t care about anyone else, but John can’t know. Frankly, this hits rather close to home for you as well, but I’ve a feeling you won’t handle it as...reasonably as John would.”

“Then you’d better hurry up and get to the point.”

“God. _God_.”

“Nope, just me. Just tell me, Mary. Write it down if you prefer.”

“No. Here, I. Freelanced. Twice. I never had a problem with...with the marks given me by the CIA. They were all Very Bad People who had done heinous things. They deserved to die. But...I was approached twice, once for an unofficial hit requested by a superior-- Also a Very Bad Person. The other time...

“I was contacted anonymously, at first and...well, and the money, whew… And I thought, after I found out who it was who had contacted me…you know there’s always whispers. Well anyone who pissed him off would also be a Very Bad Person. I was so, so wrong. But I didn’t know, Sherlock, I had no idea. I can’t see the future.  Break in here, any time, soon as you’ve figured it out…”

“I ‘figured it out’ at ‘freelanced.’ The entire time I was out hunting...you were here, with John, waiting to see if I’d pop up again. I never suspected. Oh, you’re good. And you’re right, Mary.”

“About what?”

“I owe you. And he would never, ever forgive you. Fortunately, Moriarty’s dead, and I’m sure he’s the only one besides Magnussen who knows.”

“...My God, you’re going to help me?”

“Conditionally. My first requirement is that you tell John of your past and forgive whatever overreaction he indulges in. Secondly, you will give me that jump drive in your pocket. I need to know everything if I’m to be effective, and I will not tolerate some unknown threat against John lurking out there, not even for you.”

“Not even for me? Sherlock, if I didn’t know you better, I’d say that was almost...affectionate.”

“Don’t let it go to your head. You’re marginally less annoying than any of his other women, and it’s become apparent I’m going to have to deal with his continued preference for female companionship. Consider yourself the lesser of many evils. I have a third requirement.”

“Sherlock…”

“Convince me, Mary. Convince _me_ , now, that you are no longer the assassin lying in wait for the right time. Convince me you’re no longer a threat.”

“Oh, Sherlock, I can’t. I can’t tell you I’m not a threat. But I can promise that, from now on, I will only ever be a threat to those who try to harm what I love.  If Jim Moriarty himself came back from the dead, I’d put him right back in his grave before I hurt either of you, ever.

“This isn’t working, is it. You don’t understand...this. God, you’re thick. You know what our orders were. If I was going to kill John, I would have done as soon as I saw you lying in the hallway over there. I’m good at what I do. Waiting around is sloppy, and I’ve never been sloppy. Ok, you’re nodding. What’s that mean? Did I manage to convince you? Are we good now?”

“Yes. I’m convinced. Magnussen…How much time?”

“I don't know. He only wanted me to know he had the intel."  

"“There's time then. I've played  _that_ game before."

"Sherlock, are you sure John won’t…leave?”

 What? Oh. Yes, of course I’m sure.”

“Why? How can you be?”

“Please, Mary, do you think he stands a chance against both of us?”

 

 


	16. Chapter 16

Mrs. Hudson should get an award for having the absolute _worst timing in the world_. I’m still staring at Mary who is sitting, calm as you please, in the Client Chair after having told me. Told me _what_ she is and I badly want to hit something -- or preferably someone -- and Mrs. Bloody Hudson comes traipsing in. HOW does someone do so much traipsing? And how can a woman sit so bloody still?

“What’s going on?” Mrs. Hudson asks, her eyes widening as she looks at me. Sherlock usually corners the market on rage, but I think I must be doing a pretty good job.

God, I am surrounded by mad people. How do they _find_ me? Anyone else would have seen what was going on, turned right around and left. But no. Not for me. Not for John Watson is order and fucking sanity.

“Bloody good question,” I answer, digging my fists into my hips instead of reaching over and throwing the skull at her.

“The Watsons are about to have a domestic, and fairly quickly, I hope, because we’ve got work to do,” Sherlock says.

Oh, Sherlock. Sherlock Sherlock bloody Sherlock bloody Holmes, I’m going to kill. You. _You knew._

“Oh, I have a better question,” I say, stalking towards them and glaring at Sherlock in particular because sod it, best mates are not supposed to keep secrets like this. “Is everyone I’ve _ever met_ a psychopath?”

That wanker is actually thinking about it.

“Yes.”

Knives. Knives’d work. Bullet’s efficient but it’s impersonal. Except...God, I just can’t. I can’t. Even. _Think_.  

“Good that we’ve settled that. Anyway, we …”

“Shut up, Sherlock! And stay shut up, because this is not funny.”

“I didn’t say it was funny. Why does everyone think I think everything is funny?” he says, sounding, for once in his life, properly repentant.

But I can’t look at him anymore. I can’t. So I look at her, and that’s...that’s just worse. Because she’s not her anymore, is she? This woman. There’s nothing about my Mary here, no softness, no humor, no teasing, no...nothing. It’s like she’s wearing a fucking mask, except that she isn’t anymore is she. Is this? Is this it? Is this... _reptile_... her?

“You.  What have I ever done ... hmm? ... my whole life ... to deserve _you_?” The mask -- thank God, that’s what this seems to be -- cracks just a little. Just a very little, but I haven’t lived with Sherlock this long and not learned how to translate the minutest change in expression.

“Everything, John.”

“Sherlock, I’ve told you... shut up.”

“Oh, I mean it, seriously. Everything -- everything you’ve ever done is what you did.”

“Sherlock, one more word and I will kill you.”

“You were a doctor who went to war.”

That stops me. Not just the words. The tone. It’s...reverent.

“You choose to spend all your time with a sociopath who solves crimes as an alternative to getting high. That’s me, by the way. Hello.” God help me, I want to wave back to him. But I don’t. “Even the landlady used to run a drug cartel.” The reverence is gone, but I’m still listening. This is a Sherlock I don’t often, maybe ever, see. The fact that he’s right on all counts does precisely nothing to improve my mood.

“John, you are addicted to a certain lifestyle. You’re abnormally attracted to dangerous situations and people, so is it truly such a surprise that the woman you’ve fallen in love with conforms to that pattern?”

It’s...He sounds...gentle and a little hurt...hurting and I get the distinct impression he’s...hurting for me. It opens me like a rib spreader. The hardness, the iron cords of rage that have wrapped around my chest loosen, but there is no relief. Despair and pain wiggle under the anger and resentment.

“But she wasn’t supposed to be like that,” I say, horrified at how my voice catches. I’m angry, sod it all...angry… “Why is _she_ like that?” I ask and it sounds more like begging. I spare a glance at Mary. Reptile-blank eyes exuding two impossible tracks of tears. Sherlock stares at the wall for a long moment before meeting my eyes again. His are dark and clouding.

“Because you _chose_ her,” he says simply. Grieving. And that’s it. How much? How much pain can a man stand? I thought I knew. I was wrong, wrong, _wrong_.

“Why is everything ...always ... MY FAULT?!” I bellow, and I can’t help it, it’s like my leg just...I have never broken a piece of furniture. I have invaded bloody Afghanistan and killed insurgents and lost good men and women on the operating table, and I have never regretted anything more than this stupid, asinine show of temper.  Mrs. Hudson flees, and I feel, if possible, worse.  And she...she didn’t even flinch. She’s not…this woman...

“John, listen. Be calm and answer me.” Sherlock says, crowding into my space, but I won’t back down, so he’s right there. “What is she?”

“My lying fiancee?” I ask, looking around his shoulder at her, watching her for a reaction. For any sign of guilt. There is nothing. Two tracks. Two tears, and nothing.

“No. What is she? Not in this flat; not in this room, but sitting there, in THAT chair.  Right here, right now, what is she?”

I know what she is. I know. And that makes it worse. I huff a breath out, trying, and utterly failing to release my anger, my betrayal, and my pain in that exhalation.

“Okay,” I say, turning towards him, then whipping back towards Mary. “Your way. Always your way.” Sherlock looks away and his expression is pained but that’s fine, it _should_ be. He should be pained.  He’s… he seems to be defending her. Assassin. We hunt them down, don’t we? We find them, expose them, bring their illegal, immoral acts to light and haul their asses off to prison. So why? Why is he defending her?

“At least you’re already sitting there,” I snarl at Mary, stuffing myself back into my own chair.

“Why?” she asks, and she sounds belligerent, of all things.

“Because that’s where they sit. The people who come in here with their... stories. Th-the clients,” I struggle through that one, I’ll admit it. “ – that’s all you are now, Mary. You’re a client. This is where you sit and talk.” I gesture towards my armchair and Sherlock’s as he seats himself. “And this is where we sit and listen, then we decide if we want you or not.”

Sherlock pauses briefly, meets Mary’s eyes and nods minutely. She’s watching him like a hawk watches a mouse.  What the _fuck_ is going on?  The sense of betrayal overrides everything. They...Sherlock is ganging up on me.  With her. It’s Irene fucking Adler all over again.  

“How much d’you know already?” I ask Sherlock quietly. 

He pauses, glancing at Mary. For what? Permission? The sick, dark feeling twisting in my chest undulates. I feel the sudden, brief urge to vomit.

“CIA. Assassin. Killed forty...one people.” I hear the pause but it’s irrelevant. Suddenly nothing matters except that she’s told him before she told me. She bloody well told Sherlock Holmes before she told me. “She was a good, dispassionate, methodical. A proper sociopath.”

“Oh – you can talk!” Mary mutters, and Sherlock shoots her a small smile, and dear Jesus God, I’m going to kill absolutely everyone. So...so. So why am I laughing? It’s a bit hysterical, but...I mean. How can I not? They get along so well. It’s. Well it’s fucking impossible isn’t it?

“Ohhh. Look at you two. You should get married,” I say, trying valiantly for a scowl and failing utterly. Mary looks at me uncertainly, not sure what to make of that, but Sherlock’s smile grows wider. The insufferable wanker knows I’m beaten.

“Fine, Mary, state your case,” I say, resigned, and it’s all I can do not to reach out and squeeze her knee. 

She gapes at me a moment, glances at Sherlock, and looks at the ceiling. I suppose she’s trying to figure out what her status is. It really depends on what comes out of her mouth next. I’m still monumentally pissed.

“The stuff Magnussen has on me, I would go to prison for the rest of my life,” she says simply.

I don’t know who Magnussen is, but I seriously want to kill him.

“So you were just gonna kill him,” I say flatly, not willing to admit that I’m really kind of ok with that because that’s just...that’s. Just.

“People like Magnussen _should_ be killed. That’s why there are people like me,” Mary snaps, and it’s as if a razor cuts through her voice, and the venom runs straight from her mouth into my veins. The feeling...it’s indescribable. I try to focus on what Sherlock’s saying.

“So, Mary, any documents that Magnussen has concerning yourself, you want extracted and returned.”

“...Yes,” she says finally. “That’ll..that would be great.”

I get the distinct impression that the return of documents is really only the tip of the iceberg, but I’m going to let that slide. Forbearance is a virtue after all. Especially when dealing with one Sherlock Holmes.

“Right. This’ll take some time,” Sherlock says, launching himself from his seat and rocketing across the room towards the kitchen.

“What can I do to help?” I ask absently, still trying to process everything.

“Nothing,” Sherlock answers, putting the kettle on.

Hang on, what?

“What?”

“Nothing _now_ John. Obviously. I don’t believe you appreciate the complexity of what we’re going to do,” Sherlock says, and I find a smile spreading across my face at the suppressed excitement in his voice.

”This...this will take months of careful planning.” Sherlock continues, swanning around the kitchen. “The man’s an absolute monster. Has half of parliament, maybe more in his pocket.” Sherlock’s eyes are catching fire as he flings tea cups and saucers around in some bizarre domestic ballet. He stares impatiently at the kettle and suddenly turns that intense gaze our way.

“This will be bloody brilliant,” he says. 

Mary makes a noise in the back of her throat and when I look over, she’s struggling mightily not to laugh. Her nose is crinkling up and her eyes are slit, and fucked if it’s not the most adorable thing in world, and I’m powerless. Utterly powerless. I do it. I do. I reach across the intervening twenty inches and put my hand on her knee.

“Oh, fucking Christ, thank you,”  she breathes, her laughter abruptly changing to tears that flow openly down her face. 

God help me, I love her.

“Mary,” I say quietly and she stills, her hand millimeters from mine.

“The problems of your past are your business,” I state, not sure where these words are coming from, but feeling certain they’re right. “The problems of your future are my privilege.” _Don’t ever lie to me again._

“Oh, John,” she says and I pull her over into my lap, tucking her head under my chin. 

Sherlock puts a cup of tea down beside me, and, when I look at him, he’s smiling, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. I’ve become exceptionally good at reading Sherlock’s tells.

His hand brushes my shoulder as he turns back to the kitchen and, in that brief moment of contact, a circuit of some kind is completed. The shock of…whatever...is sublime as it passes through me, and I let it flow away, unquestioning. For now.

 

 


	17. Chapter 17

The Watsons decide to stay the night, thanks in no small part to the liberal quantity of semi-celebratory libations I plied them with to ensure that outcome. I need to stock up on scotch. I quickly make a list of all the varieties Mary might like based on her appreciation of the Octamore and file it away for later. John’s tastes, if you can call them that, are so general as to not warrant consideration.

I have abstained.

They’ve just retired to John’s old room. I need to think. Seriously. For some time. About a great many things. This will be an _utterly_ EPIC think, and I’m find myself getting excited about it.

I position the jacquard pillow at a precise forty six degree angle against the leather arm of the couch and unbutton the top two buttons of my shirt. I sit and carefully unbutton cuffs of my sleeves and roll them up painstakingly, making sure the creases are precise, that the sleeves stop just below my elbow where they will offer no constriction over long periods of time and inactivity.

I have adapted this careful ritual from my days as a heroin addict, when I mistakenly assumed that careful preparation, forethought, the scientifically precise measurement of only the purest ingredients and the use of specialized equipment in lieu of a bent spoon and lighter held me above and superior to the unwashed, seething masses of human excrement who were my comrades in arms.

John has thoroughly disabused me of this notion over the course of our association and now I use the ritual to unlock and open the furthest recesses of my mind palace, having found that what I store there is, not only a replacement for heroin, but infinitely superior to it.

I recline, resting my head against the pillow that smells like my conditioner and John’s soap and angle my face against the fabric, breathing deeply, indulging in the citrusy linen melange before reaching under the couch for the box that contains the only socially and John-acceptable drug I have left at my disposal to further open the gates of the gardens in my mind.

I’m already halfway under, regarding my nonexistent creation, the tear-slap of the patches as I apply them fading in the periphery.

I float suspended in darkness, giving myself no direction, regarding and admiring my collection of data, of memories as they appear and dissolve around me rather than tearing through them.

The pattern of blood on a wall, so beautiful in it’s complexity, so telling in the angle of the droplets, the height of the lowest drip, the viscosity…

The color of ash on pavement - cigar, expensive, either Padrone’s or Davidoff, flicked from the fingers of a man about one hundred and eighty centimeters tall, just look at the corona around the central mound as it lays there, a damning cinder cone that narrowed the field of possible suspects down to one, the breathtaking beauty of the simplicity of that particular deduction still tugs at my heart…

The edges of my perceptions blur slightly, perfectly, as the nicotine floods into my system.

I breathe in again and there are clean sheets blowing in the breeze over verbena and lemongrass. I exhale and the sound of John’s voice vibrates around me. No words, just the calming resonance. His voice echoes, is augmented, lighter notes here and there, sunlight in the shadow, filtering through green leaves in in a light breeze and it’s bliss as I float there with them together.

This is not what I expected. I had thought to start ripping into Magnussen.

But I have learned to trust my subconscious priorities and this is far more pleasant. _This_ is leading somewhere, but the pull is as gentle as the magnetic attraction of a compass point. I cut the last mooring line and drift.

Strains of music float in and through the John and Mary Tree I’m leaning against rough bark and curving lines. I record it for later, it is peaceful, a waltz ¾ time, sweeping and lilting and everything I find I want from a world much different than the one I’ve known. If only...where have I heard that cadence? Where have I felt that beat tripping 4/4 to ¾ and back again?

My fingers twitch, and my back aches with phantom pain as the source of the rhythm, the memory of the origin floods back to dusty fingerprints in sunlight and a slight, flushed wrist caught in my web of fingers.

Mary’s pulse fluttering under her skin at my touch and here, alone and floating, that is beautiful and strangely humbling and not at all wrong, not at all expected or boring, an aberration, a perfect, isolated moment in ¾ time except it isn’t.

Abruptly, the music vanishes, the sunlight in leaves fades, but the beat continues, tripping back and forth, the continuity drawing me forward, into a pattern.

Not isolated, not a singular moment.

A series of moments.

The first, when I noticed that absolute artwork on her little finger.

The second...when I apologized, red, flowing silk blown against her body by the wind outlining…

A third time...the third time… Was there a?

_Bright-white light bleaching the color from our skin except for the red red of burning welts on her legs, the red of the blood on her ashen brow which is twitching, her eyes squeezing, wincing as she comes back to consciousness and pain and John’s chosen that precise moment to stretch his legs and he isn’t there and I reach for her pulse even though I can see it on the monitors I want to feel the return to life, to health in the increasing strength of the blood pumping beneath gossamer skin and it is steady, so steady and strong, so strong as she opens her eyes and she’s back, she’s there she’s surprised that it’s me, clasping her wrist loosely and there it is, the change, the flutter, the rhythm abstracted for one moment before she smiles, and there’s pain there but happiness and relief too and maybe her pupils dilate because of the drugs and maybe not I can’t tell, I_

need more data. I need more data before I can trust this...this epiphany.Three times does not a pattern complete and causality and correlation are two entirely different things. Experiments necessary.

I allow myself to relax again, releasing, drifting and his voice pervades my senses again, augmented by light, safe and sane and singularly John.

I let it wash over me like oiled silk, diving deep, plumbing his essence and my vast store of memories of him for signs and they’re everywhere, absolutely everywhere. I was blind blind not to see it and stupid stupid not to acknowledge. I trace them back back, all the way to our first encounter, our first night.

We could have had _years_.

The realization almost pulls me from my stasis, but I relinquish the thought, let go again, saving it, precious, for later.

There’s something else another connection begging to be made, another combination, every bit as important but nowhere near as personal.

Something about Mary. Something about the hospital, the burns, the burning pyre meant to consume her. Why Mary? Why Mary? I haven’t yet figured it out and it burns, the question burns as bright now as the fire that swirls around me again, as I relive that hellish time once more, letting the scene, the smoke and the flames surround me.

Fire. Destructive and creative at once, I _love_ flames, the dichotomy of them the way that they _expose one’s priorities like nothing else._

I screamed for her. I didn’t call, or shout or command or bellow, I screamed, terrified, uncontrolled, emotional, screaming as I tore through the flames and the wood to get to her.

There are several people for whom I would lay down my life, I have a list. But there is only one person for whom I would _burn_. Except now, there are two.

That fire wasn’t for Mary. It was for me.

A gift, though Magnussen couldn't have meant it as one, couldn't have known the revelation the flames would bring searing into my consciousness. For him, it was a test. Pressure points. He knows two of mine now. I will find out all of his.

There’s more. The music returns, soft and sweet, notes falling like London rain and I grow still to listen.

Release, fall back, drift. 


	18. Chapter 18

“Sherlock?” I ask, staring at the Japanese certificate over his bed. No answer. Typical. I wander out into the kitchen and he’s hovering over his microscope like some giant, dark feathered bird, gazing intently at whatever amoeba are copulating on the slide under his eye. Or something.

“Sherlock?” I ask again, and he stiffens fractionally, no doubt irritated that I’ve interrupted whatever train of thought is cannoning through that gigantic brain of his. “What’s the certificate above your bed?” I ask. That gets his attention. Kind of.

“What were you doing in my room?” he demands, not bothering to turn around.

“Defiling your sock index,” I snark.

“Hah! Hold on, how do you know about my sock index?”

“You answer my question, and I’ll answer yours.”

“Judo certificate.”

“From where?”

“Sock index?”

“John told me, you berk. Some detective you are. Where’d you study Judo?”

“Kodokan.”

Oh my _God_.

“ _Really_?” I ask breathlessly. He turns around to face me, paying full attention to me at last.

“Yes. Why is this interesting?” he asks, his eyes narrowing. I don’t know why but I think I might be blushing.

“I always wanted to...go there. To learn there,” I say slowly. I really did, ever since I was a child. I’ve had plenty of training, but it’s all been so… practical. “How was it?” I ask, sliding into the seat across from him. He thinks briefly.

“I attended for a year when I was 23,” he says. “I thought I had already surpassed anything they could teach me. Mycroft disagreed. I went to prove him wrong.”

If I took a lemon wedge and dipped it in powdered aspirin, and dipped that in hydrochloric acid and stuck it in his mouth, he could not possibly make a more sour face.

“I’m guessing that didn’t go as planned.”

“Nope,” he says, popping the plosive, his lips twisting upwards. “It was an unexpectedly intense experience. I stayed far longer than I planned.”

I nod, tracing patterns on the table with my forefinger, trying to image what it would be like to treat fighting like an art rather than a necessity. Sherlock’s staring at his slides again, and John won’t be home for hours yet. _Bored_.

“Bet ten quid I could take you down.” The words are out of my mouth before I realize it. A lone eyebrow ascends from behind the eyepiece.

“I very much doubt that, Mary. Though I’m sure your Krav Maga, or whatever it is those cretins taught you, is highly effective against the dross you dealt with regularly.”

“I brought John down.”

“I’m not interested in your bedroom escapades, Mary.”

Oh _really_. Shame, that. Wait, what?  

“Heard a woman laid you low before. Afraid to let it happen again?”

“She had the help of narcotics and a riding crop.”

“Sherlock, I’m not interested in your bedroom escapades.” That gets a bark of laughter.

“John would kill me if I hurt you by accident.”

“Ohhhh, look who’s so optimistic,” I crow. “And no one who trained at Kodokan would do anything by accident. Except fall to the better fighter. And that’s more of an inevitability than an accident in this case.”

“Mary--”

“Oh no, It’s ok. I understand completely. I wouldn’t want to admit to getting trounced by a lady again either.”

“Don’t be sexist, Mary, my greatest teacher was a woman.”

“Then what the hell, Sherlock?”

“I’m working!”

“ _Fuck_ , I’m so _bored_!” The table rattles as I slam my fists down, my frustration bubbling over.

Sherlock snaps his head up from the microscope, and the breadth of his smile is truly astounding. It totally transforms his face. It’s one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen, and I vow then and there to find it every single chance I get.

“Don’t move,” he says and whisks away to his bedroom. Intrigued, I wrap my legs around the legs of the chair and chew on my thumb, wondering what on earth he can be doing.

He sweeps into the room and something white is hurled at my face. I catch it and unfold the fabric. It’s a lightweight uwagi and obi. He’s traded his tshirt for one as well.

“Sherlock, I’m not going to let you disadvantage me by making me wear clothing to big for me,” I say laughing. He smirks.

“Hold it up.”

I lay the obi on the table and hold the Uwagi up to my shoulder, laying the sleeve over my arm. To my complete surprise, it looks like it’ll fit.

“How old were you when you wore this?” I ask softly.

“Thirteen. Put it on. I’m going to ‘take you down’ as you so inelegantly suggested,” he says with a smirk.

I grin and stand, quickly divesting myself of my jumper and shrugging on the Uwagi over my camisole. The sleeves fall perfectly to my wrists. I tie the obi around my waist and toe off my shoes. Sherlock’s already in the other room, bouncing around like an absolute nutter.

I feel the flutter of excitement as I stretch my lats and legs, cracking my back and flexing my toes. Sherlock’s stopped his mad jittering and is now standing in the center of the room between the sofa table and John’s chair, still as a statue, his arms at his sides, hands relaxed, eyes downcast.

Close quarters against an expert Judo master. I’m going to fall back on my training. Krav Maga may not be elegant but it is ridiculously effective against grappling. He has height, weight and probably flexibility, on me, the gangly git, but I have some surprises up my sleeve, primarily a very American portion of aggression which always seems to surprise people.

I feel adrenaline sparkle through my blood, raising my heart rate and my in response, my breathing levels and my limbs steady. I’ve seen this same reaction in John. I don’t remember a time in my life when I’ve reacted to stress the same way as everyone else. I wonder how Sherlock handles it. From the looks of things, he doesn’t have to. In lieu of the traditional Salute, I get a cocked eyebrow.

“Try not to be too borin--”

I don’t even give him the chance to finish, moving forward quickly, but not too quickly. I need to see how he’ll respond in order to craft my strategy. He brings his arm up and slides a foot out so fast I barely see it.

But _quite_ fast enough. I sidestep his foot, looping my arm around his as I pass under it, elbowing him in the ribs in the process. I tweak my arm upwards on my way past, trapping his arm against my side, and I use my shorter stature as a lever to flip him over my back, rolling him onto the ground. I back away, pushing the coffee table against the couch behind me, opening up the floor.

He scissors his legs and pops himself up off the ground, grinning like an idiot, positively chuffed to have been knocked off his feet. I find myself laughing.

I can’t even properly see what he does next, it’s so fast. I just know that I’m blocking jabs, punches and kicks, and I realize he’s already adapted from grappling. He’s setting a cadence which I know he’ll change as soon as I...There it is, a kick instead of a slap, and I’m ready for it, catching his foot against my thigh with my arm and jerking forward, using his momentum against him, rolling him over my back again.

This time, he lands on his ass, cracking his head lightly on the window sill.

He giggles. Fucking _giggles_ , and launches himself back at me, forcing me back towards the chair in front of the glass panel next to the door. There’s a stack of files next to the chair, and I hitch my foot under it and let fly.

This turns out to be a mistake. I dodge to my left towards the door, away from the chair, but in the confusion of flying papers, Sherlock’s apparently reached forward and opened the door. The bastard must be hanging onto it because when I slam face first into it, it doesn't so much as budge.

Before I know it, I’m crowded against the wall behind the door. Instinctually, I bend my knees slightly before he pins my right arm above my head and my left by my hip, pinning my leg with his thigh.

“Checkmate,” he purrs, out of breath, bowing his head over mine to meet my eyes.

I tilt my head back against the wall, so I can look him in the eye, try to figure out what he’s going to do next, and I’m suddenly very, very aware of his proximity, the way his chest presses against mine as he sucks air. I find myself doing a quick comparison between his impossibly light eyes to John’s warm, dark blue ones, finding that I love them both for entirely different reasons. I smile, shutting my eyes briefly, focusing, trying to gauge how much clearance I’ll have.

“That word. I do not think it means what you think it means,” I say knowing he won’t get the reference and not caring ‘cause, hey, I was the bored one.

“I fail to see where a faux Spanish accent come into-”

All I have to do in the end is straighten my knees as explosively as I can. The top of my head slams into his chin, and he staggers backwards. After that it’s a simple matter of sweeping his right leg out just...now… just as he steps backwards, and he’s sprawling.

I pitch down, grabbing his right arm and trapping it under mine while rolling on top of him, using my torso to pin him on his back to the floor. I wedge my other arm over his left arm as it comes up to knock me off, effectively immobilizing his upper body. I scissor my legs open just enough to give me leverage to hold him still when he starts to struggle.  He can flail those long legs around all he wants, it won’t do any good.

He ceases struggling a moment, and I count down the seconds till…. Sherlock stills completely, taking our positions into consideration, and then goes off like a claymore mine. I loosen up just enough to let him roar with laughter.

“Kesa Gatame, motherfucker,” I laugh into his face, and he positively howls.

“The...God, scarf hold? Hah! I give, I yield, get off.”

“I’m sorry, what was that? I don’t think I heard you, Sherlock.”

“I give up! Get off, I can’t breathe with you draped all over me like that.”

“Funny, John never has a problem.”

“John probably doesn’t have your elbow digging into his lung.”

“Fair point. Fine, you pansy, get up,” I say, hopping off him and offering him a hand. He takes it and I lean back as I pull him up. He stands, rubbing his chin where I whacked him and grins.

“Back at the beginning,” I said, “ Just after I had you down, that combo, what was that? I couldn’t see, really. I could barely keep up.” I try for just the right amount of respect and curiosity, but it appears I needn't have worried. Sherlock's in a teaching mood. Lucky me.

“Simple really, just a matter of keeping your core still while you rotate around it.” he demonstrates, and it’s like watching water fall over rocks. I make him repeat it.

I think I get it, but when I try to replicate the combination, I get my signals crossed and can’t quite manage. We spend a very pleasant hour, and I learn more about core control than they ever taught me before. Maybe we can take a trip to Japan on our honeymoon, I think absently.

Both of us freeze as we hear the front door open and close.

“He’s bringing up the shopping,” I murmur, my eyes lighting up. “His hands’ll be full.” I count the steps down...

17, 16, 15,

“That’s not fair at all,” Sherlock agrees, taking his position behind the door, his hand on the knob.

10, 9, 8,

“Just try to save the milk, yeah? I fancy a cuppa and I don’t know what’s in the carton in the fridge, but it’s _not_ milk,” I hiss, taking my position on the other side of the door.

4, 3, 2

“Bull semen,” Sherlock whispers. Dear Lord.

John fumbles with the door handle, and Sherlock takes a page out of my book, waiting till John has grasped the handle before yanking the door in.

John’s hands enter the room first and Sherlock neatly divests him of the bags he’s holding. I grab those lovely, stubby little fingers, pulling him hard towards me and he shouts as he loses his balance. I pull on one shoulder, twisting him as he falls so he’s facing me just as I catch him around his shoulders, dipping him low and kissing him soundly on the lips. Just as his lips soften against mine, I drop him the remaining 6 inches onto the ground and straddle him, crouching over him, scowling critically.

“You really should keep on your toes, lover mine,” I say. He’s screwed his face up in a valiant effort not to laugh. “Honestly, you’d think after living so long with Sherlock you’d be more...prepared.”

“I’m sorry, how exactly does one prepare for being ambushed by one’s best mate and one’s fiancee?” He asks, losing his battle with laughter. “Come to think of it, considering the nature of the attack, why would I want to?” he asks, reaching up to cup my cheek in his hand.

“Mary, beat him. He’s not brought any milk at all,” Sherlock gripes from behind me, abruptly dropping the bags on the ground.

“Oi! There’s crisps in there and eggs, you berk!” John yells, scowling around my shoulder.

“Neither of which are useful when mixed with tea.”

“There’s milk in the fridge,” John snipes.

Sherlock’s eyes light up. “Oh yes! You’re right. Let me make you a cuppa right now,” he says, practically scampering to the kitchen.

“Don’t you dare, Sherlock Holmes!” I yell after him. “Bull semen,” I explain to John. He rolls his eyes and I take our moment of relative privacy and snog the hell out of my John, running my hands quickly over his chest and up his neck, sighing into his mouth as he grips my hips hitching me closer.

God I love the way his hands feel. Small and so strong. They fit perfectly no matter where he touches me. So different from Sherlock’s. The memory of his hands clamped around my wrists, fingers pressing into the flesh below my palms rises unbidden and I feel my skin flush. Bit not good, that, but who can blame me. The man’s a fucking Adonis.

I make up for my impure thoughts by snogging my own Achilles until I notice a suspicious trickle of oozing, viscous...mess seeping toward us from under the bags. Eggs. Goddamn it. John follows my gaze and moans, and not the good kind.

“ _Sherlock_!!”  


	19. Chapter 19

File: The Voltaire Case

Status: Password Protected

**Case Notes:**

I had been somewhat at a loss as to how to effectively replicate the physical symptoms of attraction in Mary for the sake of proving the hypothesis arrived at during my recent Great Think when she handed the opportunity right to me by way of challenging me to sparring after having professed interest (unfeigned) in my Judo training.

The fact that she is a far more capable opponent than I assumed, presumably having taken instruction over and above the tuition offered by her former employers, should have no bearing on this case except it does, which details I will relate later.

I recorded her pulse no fewer than four times during our match and watched for her other quite distinctive tells. Her physiological responses to our activity only deviated from what would be considered normal under stressful conditions only once.

I had (finally) pinned her, having pressed her wrists to a wall and further limited her motion by way of pressing various points of my body against hers in what might, by the most vulgar observer, be considered as a sexually compromising position.

Her pulse deviated radically. I observed  her skin flushing from the tops of her breasts to the tips of her cheek bones. These signs, coupled with suddenly dilated pupils, a sudden increase in respiration, and barely discernable trembling in her extremities is conclusive enough proof for me that she is, in fact, physically attracted to me.

The verification of a hypothesis in isolation is no cause for comment as 95% of my hypotheses are verified when subjected to the rigours of the scientific method.

What does bear further mention is not the fact that I was right about Mary’s attraction, but that I seem to have inadvertently proved that the attraction is entirely mutual, as evidenced by a sudden, surprisingly violent surge of sexual attraction, usually reserved for my own gender, and one member of that gender in particular. This attraction manifested in an almost undeniable compulsion to press more firmly against her and kiss her until she lost the ability to breathe.

Fortunately, I have become inured to these compulsions over my long association with John and was able to avoid any premature expressions of romantic affection. I was however, distracted enough to allow Mary to pull a move on me that even the most junior initiate would have been able to avoid.

I would be considerably more vexed by this development except that it resulted in Mary successfully articulating a pun in Judo, by using a specific control hold, the scarf hold, to be exact, modified slightly so that it effectively incapacitated me.

For the sake of science I will now admit that the feeling of her weight pressing down on my chest coupled with my utter inability to extricate myself may be one of the most erotic things I have experienced to date.

For the sake of science I will also admit that her use of the scarf hold delighted me in a way that I have not been delighted since John last told me I was brilliant.*

Not long after, John returned and we cooperated sufficiently to pull off a somewhat complex maneuver that ended with her straddling his hips and snogging him nearly senseless, making him the beneficiary of my carefully stitched cloth of seduction.*

 **Conclusions** :

-Mary is at least physically attracted to me.

-Judging by her previous nonsexual physical overtures she is also at least fond of me.*

-I may be falling in actual love with Mary, whatever that means.

-I am (have been) in love with John, whatever that means.

-The standard conventions of monogamous relationships do not seem to be sufficient in this situation.

 **Further** **Tasks** :

-Ascertain John’s level of attraction and affection

        -Should these levels be consonant with mine and Mary’s, find a way to broach the subject of polyamory.

        -Should they not be, abandon experiment and continue status quo.

 

*It’s been far too long. Get a case immediately and impress John.

*It should be noted that I am not actually jealous, having taken the opportunity to watch from the kitchen.

*Fondness+Sexual attraction=Love? Why is this so confusing?


	20. Chapter 20

“John, do you like this flat?”

“Yes? It’s a flat, certainly, and you live here. I like living where you live. Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Mmmm.”

“What is it, love? You do not look happy. How can I make you look happy?”

“I think I’ll take the nursing job at the clinic,”

“That would be lovely. I’d get to see you all the time. Has this got something to do with the flat? You still look unhappy. That is unacceptable.”

“You sound like him sometimes.”

“Yeah, he tends to grow on you. Like an annoying rash.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Of course not. What’s...what’s this about, Mary? You’ve been off for days now.”

“You’ll...I don’t know if you’ll understand, John.”

“Try me. Come here. I’ll wrap my arms around you like this, and you lean back like that, and I it’ll magically be easier to tell me what’s bothering you.”

“This is nice. Maybe if I just press up against you like this, you’ll gain understanding through osmosis.”

“If you keep pressing up against me like that, love, I’ll gain something that has nothing whatsoever to do with osmosis. Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t be at all opposed, but I think we need to have this conversation. I hate seeing you so...this. No, don’t apologize, just tell me what’s wrong. If I can, I’ll fix it.”

“This place...has it ever felt like home to you?”

“...No. Only when you’re, you know, physically in it.”

“Me too. D'you know how I decorated? I called a company that delivers everything, you know? You choose a package and they just dump everything on your doorstep. I...I didn’t even look at the catalogue. I just picked a number. This flat is collection #4. I never… I never thought I’d ever have to make choices like this. Have a...a life like this. I hate it a bit.”

“I don’t know why you’d think I wouldn't understand that.”

“I didn’t want you to think it had to do with you. I love you, John, more than I have ever loved anything. It’s just...Everything else. I hate it. I’m bored. Not with you.”

“You don’t have to keep qualifying it, Mary. We’re ok. Great in fact. I...I know what you mean about the rest of it. It’s...pale.”

“I want to move. Into the city.”

“You really will have to take the job then, and I mean talk about boring…unless...”

“I knew you’d get there in the end.”

“I wonder if he’ll agree?”

“We’ll just make him think it’s his idea.”

“Brilliant. How?”

“Leave it to me, love.”

“...Mary? That osmosis thing? Let’s try it. For the sake of science.”

 

 


	21. Chapter 21

My phone buzzes so violently it falls of the table. It’s a text from Mary.

_Our landlord isn’t renewing our lease._

I stare at the at message, wondering why on _earth_ it didn’t occur to me to have Mycroft buy that blasted building and evict everyone in it months ago.

_Not enough room here. -SH_ I answer.

_Wasn’t asking, just complaining._

_I loathe your furniture. It can’t come with you. -SH_

_I wasn’t asking._

_And that horrid artwork. That can’t come either. -SH_

_I wasn’t asking! And that art is wonderful._

_It’s not.  You didn’t even pick it. I won’t tolerate it in our flat. Or that excuse for a table lamp in your living room. Hideous. Leave it behind. -SH_

_How did you know? Never mind. Also? Not asking! Just complaining._

_I will be indebted to you if you misplace a box of John’s jumpers. Specifically the fair isle. I will repay that debt by purchasing tolerable replacements. -SH_

_You git, I love his jumpers and so do you. We’ll be by this evening. Get your bloody boxes out of John’s room._

I pocket the phone and stare at the disaster area that is the kitchen, wondering if I should clean it up as a welcome home gift. I wonder if the loo’s big enough for three people. I wonder if I’ve bought enough scotch. A frisson of fear thrills through me and I shiver.

Even I know the odds of things remaining as they are once we’re all bottled up here together. I force myself to accept the fact that this could go either way. Either I will achieve everything I have ever wanted for myself or I will lose the only thing that has ever mattered to me.

I stand in John’s room and breathe deeply. They’ve spent some nights here and the aroma they create when they’re together lingers heady in the air. The clean linen of John’s soap and gun oil from his obsessive weapon cleaning and the bergamot shot with hints of vanilla from the scent Mary prefers and something darker, musky and entirely intoxicating.

I fight the urge to wrap myself in the crumpled duvet on their bed and resolve to do whatever I can to make sure that the outcome of this...this massive, insane,  _terrifying_ experiment is the right one. I am admittedly out of my element here, but damn it I’m a fucking _genius_ and idiots like Anderson figure this out every day. I will solve them. _I will solve this._

I still suddenly, knowing what I can do, the first thing I can do that will...Oh it’s perfect. I wonder if there’s time? There has to be time. I’ll _make_ time. I’ll go now.

 

 


	22. Chapter 22

I kick open the door to 221B with my foot. It’s unlocked. John’s still hauling the other boxes out of the rental, parked temporarily just down the street. It’s obscene, how little we have between us. A few boxes of clothes, exactly one box of sentimental knick-knacks, most of which are also weapons. A box of baking paraphernalia, the only kitchen implements that aren’t already at Baker Street John says. I wonder for the third time in as many hours if we’re not mad and decide for the third time that it doesn’t matter even if we are. Life’s too fucking short not to be happy.

This is something John and I know in our bones without ever having to say it. It’s why our relationship proceeded so fast once it got properly started. It’s why, in the end, I’ve grown so ridiculously attached to the madman, who isn’t helping us move into his flat, so quickly. And it’s fine, all of it. We decided this afternoon that this will make us both happy. Why delay?

I trudge up the stairs box-laden and kick open the door to the flat.

“Sherlock a little help here please-- oh my God. You _didn’t_.” I say, gasping. He’s standing by it grinning like a dressing gown-clad lion who has just brought down a water buffalo by himself. He deserves to. It’s...It’s so…The box tumbles out of my hands. It’s just jumpers anyway. Took that one up first on purpose, but I forget why now.

I walk across the room to it and run my hand over the smooth, supple leather cushions, dragging my fingernails along the inlaid wood frame. It’s stands nestled between his and John’s, tables between all three. It will be the perfect size for me to curl up in, like I like to. There’s a soft, silky looking silver grey afghan pooled in the crook of arm and seat cushion.

“I thought you’d appreciate the Japanese influences,” he says, and I realize it does look Japanese, with the way the chair arms swoop downward and the back angles gracefully out at the top. The inlay in the exposed wood frame is grey, geometric and utterly graceful.

“Your Nibs,” I say, turning to face him,” I request permission for a tactile display of appreciat-”

Groaning elaborately he tugs me to him, wrapping his arms around me. Apparently, practice makes perfect. There is no hesitation or awkwardness, just...warmth as his arms circle my shoulders and my waist.

“Never ask again,” he mutters into my hair. 

I smile, wrapping my arms around his waist, hearing John come through the door and relishing his soft sigh. He loves seeing us together, I can tell. He’d set himself up for a lifetime of juggling, did my John, when Sherlock came back. I bet he thanks some higher power every day that he doesn’t have to.

“Wow, Sherlock,” he says, plopping his box down next to mine and grinning at the setup in front of the fireplace. “That’s really. Really, um. Good.” He comes up to the chair. “Really nice.” His hand is on the chair, stroking the wood absently, but his eyes are on us.

You get to know someone pretty well when you’re in love with them, and John has always been beautifully expressive. I can read his mood, sometimes even his thoughts, from the slightest tick of his fingers, the barest twist of his lips. The expression gracing his gentle features now is a new one on me. Seeing it, I wonder suddenly if those little...thoughts I’ve been having don’t have some chance after all. Maybe...a little experiment.

I feel Sherlock’s breath hitch in his chest...barely noticeable, but I am pressed rather firmly against him and that’s nice. Did he just read my mind? Must have done...his fingers, God, those long, slender fingers splay open just slightly against my shoulder and the small of my back, pressing me ever so slightly closer to him . The gesture is protective and maybe just a teeny tiny bit possessive. It’s such an infinitesimally small change in posture, but it changes everything and I sigh and melt just a bit, resting the side of my head against his sternum regarding John steadily, curiously.

His eyes widen fractionally and he breathes in, not to protest (protest what? ‘Sherlock stop hugging my Mary so...intensely’?) but because he clearly needs the oxygen, his hand strokes the leather cushion and I wonder what he’s imagining it is...not a chair for Christ sakes, not with that look in his eyes as he meets _Sherlock’s_ eyes! I saw it! It’s there!

I laugh suddenly, shattering this two-second moment that might as well have gone on for eternity. We have time now, lots of time, and we’ll do this right, and right now there’s a hire car parked illegally and boxes and things need done and tea needs made.

Evidently the same thoughts pass through Sherlock’s mind because his face is suddenly an absolute study of the words _platonic_ and _fond_. I tighten my arms suddenly, squeezing him hard enough to make him squeak, and he scowls, and it’s all so normal again.

“Care to help us carry?” John asks wryly, his hand still stroking the leather of my beautiful, perfect, impossibly meaningful chair.

Sherlock snorts, rolling his eyes and turns to the window, reaching for his violin.

“Boxes are boring, John. Besides, you’re a steady little pack animal and I had to lug that chair all the way up the stairs earlier.

“Hah! Pull the other one, Sherlock.”

“Well, I supervised intensely,” Sherlock snarks, flipping his bow around in his hand and turning back towards the window.

We accomplished the rest of the move, such as it was, amidst the backdrop of a Brahms sonata, which was beautiful and probably much more helpful than Sherlock supervising while John carried boxes. 


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Here there be porn.

Later that night as I lay in our bed in our room waiting for John to join me, I feel sated in a way that I haven’t felt since the first few nights I spent in his company.

The mixture of music, takeout, scotch and woodsmoke and this place calm the exact part of me that was stretched to the point of breaking not eight hours ago. It never ceases to amaze me how quickly lives and fortunes can change. Eight years ago, I was a successful, deadly agent in the morning, and pulled from the field and sent into early retirement in the afternoon. I take a moment to indulge in my customary if-I-ever-find-who-burned-me revenge thoughts for a moment, but they lack the previously ascribed violence.

After all, if my name had not potentially ended up on a burn list, I would never have met John, never have found my way here. And now that we are here, living in this place, with Sherlock, I wouldn't trade my life for anything in the world. The knowledge is a gift. If I believed in a personal God who cared about what happened to me, I’d thank her. But I don’t, so I just breathe a contented sigh and listen for the sound of John’s step on the stair.

I’ve all but drifted off when he climbs into bed beside me. He makes no effort whatsoever to avoid disturbing me, kneeling next to me and pulling back the duvet. A thrill of anticipation sparkles through my sleep soaked consciousness and sets my heart racing just before he reaches for me, running his hands through my hair, down the sides of my face and over my breasts before tugging me to my knees and pressing me close.

I sigh happily, sliding my arms around his neck leaning into him, pressing my body into his, and the heat of his skin against my breasts and belly burns gloriously.

He wraps an arm around me, pressing his hand firmly between my shoulder blades while his other slides up the side of my body and I sigh as fists his hand in my hair at the nape of my neck, tugging my head back to bare my throat.

I moan, low and needy as he drags his teeth down the side of my neck, nipping and kissing a path of fire down to the dip of my shoulder where he bites. I cry out softly as he forms his lips around that tender, sensitive bit of flesh and nibbles, bites, kisses and tongues me into a wordless, boneless, writhing, compliant creature of blinding need and aching want.

It is everything, this surrender.  It’s air underwater and rain in the desert and all manner of other superlative analogies that I can’t be arsed to make up right now.

Nothing, and I mean _nothing_ in this world wrecks me as completely as being so utterly possessed by this man. Because normally? I eat and _breathe_ control. I control my accent, my bearing, my diet, my emotions, my tells, my temper, literally everything, every day of my life. So to let go like this? To surrender that control, even for a little while, is a damn near orgiastic relief just by itself.

Fortunately, command comes easily to my Captain, and once he realized how much I needed this release, this submission, he damn well went about giving it to me in every way he could think of.

And that? That’s just fucking _marvellous_.

My brain derails completely as he bends over me, arcing me backwards, and drags his hand, nails down, over the skin of my chest and belly and slides his fingers under the waistband of my knickers.

He cups my mons and I thrust into his hand, seeking friction and finding none as he teases me, capturing a nipple in his lips and mouthing it, nibbling lightly before biting down hard, as he strokes the pads of two fingers into my cleft, wetting them before pressing and rubbing circles over my clit which transforms the sharp pain in my breast into almost unbearable pleasure. I writhe against him and I would beg for more if I could find the words. Instead, I shudder, my breathing transformed into a succession of gasps and whimpers.

John slams himself against me, his cock tracing a hard length against my belly, hot through his pants and I grind against him, rutting against his hand and rubbing along the length of him. He growls deep and the sound of his voice is catalytic and I need, I need so much more, everything in fact. Everything.  

I pull myself up against him, tilting my head up and brushing my lips against the line of his jaw, flicking my tongue out to lick at his bottom lip. He moans and brings both hands up to clasp around my face and his lips are soft and insistent when they meet mine, teasing my mouth open. My moan is muffled against his lips when he suddenly presses his tongue between mine in broad, aggressive strokes.

I open to him, and he fucks my mouth slowly with his tongue, each sweep somehow adding to the ache pooling between my legs and I feel deliciously swollen and impossibly wet-- ready, so _ready_ to be touched.

Whatever neurons are not currently melting as he drags his hands down my arms, pinning them behind my back, decide to get together and order my hips forward. He obligingly shoves a leg forward and I find myself straddling him, rubbing against his leg like a fucking teenager trying desperately to ease this unbearably delicious aching while he tightens his grip on my arms.

His chuckle translates as pure vibration in my head where it rests against his chest.

“God, love, you are just gagging for it, aren’t you?” he asks breathlessly, beyond pleased with himself.

I smile, mouthing and suckling a nearby nipple erect in answer. The resulting choked gasp and the quick, convulsive buck of his hips creates a desperate need in me to drive him as mad as he’s driving me.

I nuzzle, kiss and lick my way across his broad chest feeling every cord of muscle straining, every beat of his galloping pulse singing against my lips and tongue until I brush up against his other nipple.

I moan deep in my throat as he hisses at that light contact, curling my lips around the tight, succulent nub and teasing, lightly flicking him with the tip of my tongue, making my movements a metaphor for similar activities I desperately hope will occur in the very, very near future.

“Jesus _fucking_ Christ,” he rumbles suddenly, and his fingers are digging into my shoulders, pushing me roughly down and I bend and yield, falling under him, reclining as he straddles my waist, remaining latched to his chest and suckling until he forces himself away from me, catching my hands and forcing my arms up over my head. He wraps my fingers around the bars that of the headboard and squeeze my fists around them once, the command implicit-- _don’t dare move or I’ll stop_ \-- and my pulse ratchets up yet again as he slides down my body.

He takes my mouth, sweeping his tongue across my teeth and twining it round my own before burning a trail down my throat to my sternum where he drags his teeth across the scar I wear between my breasts. My knuckles whiten around the rungs as he rolls my nipples between his thumbs and forefingers, tugging and teasing until I’m gasping again, bucking my hips against his hard stomach.

“John,” I moan. “John, _please_.”

“Please what, love? Just ask me for what you want, and I’ll give it to you.” He already knows what I want. But he does so love to hear it.

“Please, I need… _God_ , I need your mouth on me,” I pant, twisting my hands around the bars and arching my back as he tugs on my breasts again. “John,” And his name is like a prayer. “Please...make me come and then fuck me through this fucking mattress,” I snarl. “Please, please…”

He’s breaking me down, exposing parts of me, layer after layer after layer...And I would tell him everything. I’d tell him all my secrets, now, if he asked, but he loves me, so he doesn’t.

Instead, he works his way down my belly, dipping his tongue into my belly button which makes me squirm, ghosting his hands gently down my sides until he grasps my thighs, in a sudden, bruising grip, pushing them roughly apart, spreading me wide. He kneels there, between my legs, bent low, licking and kissing a tortuous path across the rise of my mons, his breath huffing hot, teasing, infuriatingly _close_ to where I need him the most. I arch my  back, and he grips my thighs hard, spreading me wider, keeping me from bucking as he canvases every inch of flesh around my clit, lapping at my cleft, moaning at how wet he finds me and nibbling down my thighs until I’m whimpering with every single breath.

“John, _John_ , please,” I beg, my voice breaking, reaching deep into my severely compromised mind to find words.

He chuckles and squeezes my thighs, and I’m about to turn the corner from utmost arousal to frustrated rage when, without warning, the heat of his mouth suddenly envelopes me, his tongue swirling and flicking, lightly-- so delicately-- and it’s all I can do to keep gripping the bars as ordered as I keen, arching off the mattress as every single solitary over-wrought, overly sensitized atom in my body contracts at the same time.

It’s the absolute fastest I’ve ever come from this, and I’d regret that a little, except he’s still there, gently laving me with his tongue till I stop shuddering. It’s incredible, lying here for a split second, _knowing_ that there is still more amazing to come.

I let go of the bars and reach for John, pulling at his shoulders, urging him up my body, impatient, because one ache just sated has left a deeper need.

“John, if you’re not inside me in the next three seconds, I won’t be responsible for what happens to you,” I growl, and he grins like a madman and tugs at his pants, which he’s somehow still wearing, and I kiss his face, tasting myself on his lips and his chin, and everything goes a little white around the edges as I grasp his cock in my hand, guiding him against me.

He pauses, the wonderful _bastard_ , just as his glans rubs against my skin, and he huffs a breath into the hollow of my neck, and I want to scream, but instead, I reach up with my other hand and stroke his hair and his jaw and pull him down into another kiss and finally, _finally_ , he breaches me, filling me utterly. I wrap my legs around the back of this thighs and keep him there, sheathed to the hilt and gasping for breath, and revel in him for a moment before realizing that we need to _move_.

John shudders against me and pushes himself up, his arms bracketing my shoulders and pulls almost all the way out, clenching his jaw and pressing his eyes shut as he fights for control. I don’t make it easy, writhing against him and wrapping my arms around his shoulders and waist, urging him to move, God, please move _move_.

“John! God, fuck me,” I order, and his eyes pop open, I can see them shining in the darkness.

“Ok,” he says, grinning, and pistons into me and _fucked_ if it isn’t the best feeling in the world. He pulls up and away from me, and I brace my feet on either side of his knees where he kneels angling myself up to get him deeper, faster. He grasps my hips and pulls me towards him, and that’s heaven itself. I reach my arms back and grasp the rungs of the headboard again, not in submission but to give my body an anchor, to push back against something as he pushes up into me.

The build up is slower this time, but watching John undulating above me is as intoxicating as the feeling of him inside me.  The muscles of his chest and arms  are exquisitely defined after prolonged effort, his head thrown back and his eyes are half hooded, his lips slightly parted, every breath ending in a quiet moan as he focuses on the sensations flooding through him.

Sherlock may be an Adonis, but this man, this vital, powerful, gentle, violent, walking dichotomy of a man twisting within me is beautiful beyond all reckoning.

I peak at that moment, with the both of them paramount in my mind and I reach for John, and he grasps my hand and presses it to his chest above his heart and my body convulses around him and he follows me, calling out my name like he’s lost in the darkness that surrounds us and falls boneless against me.

I stretch out languidly beneath him, making no move to unseat him, and twine my arms and legs around him, kissing the briny moisture from his brow and making small contented noises with every other breath.

“Thank you love. Thank you, thank you, thank you,” he murmurs suddenly, shoving his face against my neck with a finality that suggests he’ll take up residence there. And that would be fine.

“Mmm? For what? That was amazing sweety. I should be thanking _you_.” He chuckles, nuzzling his nose against my neck before rolling off and spooning around me and pulling up the sheet around us.

“No, no, not that, though Jesus Christ, yes that too. But. This. Being here. Moving here. It’s insane. We’ll be married, living with Sherlock Holmes. People will talk.” He laughs softly.

I sigh contentedly, picking up his left hand from where it rests over my belly and kissing his knuckles.

“This is all good, John. All of it. Every bit of being here is right and perfect, and I want it. Since when have we ever been arsed about what’s sane or not?” I ask wiggling back closer against him. Sometimes I feel a strong compulsion to clean up after sex. This, apparently is not one of those times.

“I can’t believe he got you that chair,” John continues, and I hear the delight and surprise in his voice. Facing away from him, I can't see his smile, and that’s a shame. “You bring out a softer side in him, you know.” he continues and I chuckle.

“I tend to do that with intense, high strung men.” I murmur, brushing my lips over the palm of his hand. He squeezes me appreciatively.

“He seems so much more... comfortable around you,” John continues, and I wonder if our post coital pillow talk will revolve around Sherlock Holmes for the foreseeable future. Yeah, I decide, remembering that look in John’s eyes as he watched Sherlock hold me. It will. And that’s fine. There are far more boring subjects.

“How so?” I ask, genuinely curious. I feel my heart glow a little, thinking I might already be just a bit special to him.

“He, ah. Well look at tonight, yeah?  He hugs you and, I don’t know, lets you touch him.” John murmurs, and he sounds quietly jealous. No, I decide as rub my thumb over the deeply ridged lifeline on his palm. Not jealous. Sad. Wistful.

This, I decide, is an odd conversation. Not bad odd, just-- odd. I think quickly, realizing that John’s talking about something that’s bothered him for a while and I’ll only have the few precious, unguarded moments between sex and sleep to wrinkle it out.

As long as I have known him, John has been a rather tactile man. With me, of course, but with almost everyone. He shakes hands, cuffs shoulders, bumps legs--lots of shoulder hugs for the ladies. He’s a compact tornado of physical camaraderie.

Except around Sherlock.

There is this...invisible barrier between the two of them that moves with them and only disappears when something’s REALLY distracting. Baby steps. That’s the first thing that has to go.

“Sherlock loves being touched,” I say after some consideration.

“Noooo he doesn’t,” He counters, with a low chuckle. “You should have seen the look on his face when this new guy down at the Yard clapped him on the shoulder the other day. Thought we were going to be dealing with another murder.”

I snort. I can well imagine.

“Let me edit that statement. Sherlock loves to be touched by those he trusts, those he cares about. So lets, see, that’s you, Mrs. Hudson, and now apparently me. Possibly his brother, I don’t know I’ve never seen them around each other.”

“Definitely not Mycroft.” John says, his whole body shaking with mirth, which is lovely.

“Ok, fine, not Mycroft. But certainly you, John. If you’d let yourself.” He grunts noncommittally. “Oh,” I continue, “Not like he’d ever admit it, let alone initiate it. In fact, I’d be willing to bet he’s the cause of this little bit of awkward in your lives.  

“But sometimes you have to ask forgiveness rather than permission, my love. I’m not suggesting you walk downstairs and snog his face off in the morning,” I say though that lovely little image lingers. _Lovely_. “But I bet you fifty quid that if you give him half a chance, he’ll be leaning against you like a felled tree every chance he gets.” That gets a laugh out of John.

“Oh, God, I can see that. Yeah, maybe I should let be. Sherlock hanging about my shoulders like a needy toddler might not go over well at crime scenes.”

I snort, and John chuffs a breath right next to my ear and yawns, snuggling in more comfortably behind me.

As we drift off to sleep, all manner of scenes I have no right to imagine lull me the rest of the way to sleep. Hey, a girl can dream right?


	24. Chapter 24

“John. You haven’t bought a ring yet.”

“Jesus, Sherlock, you startled me. I thought you in the kitchen with that boiling slop on the hob. Which is no longer on the hob, I trust, since you are here in my room.”

“Obviously. Why have you not bought a ring for Mary yet? And why are you cleaning your gun again?”

“We went shooting yesterday, and I haven’t found the right one.”

“You realize it’s customary to give your fiancee an engagement ring before the actual wedding, yes? That the engagement ring and the wedding ring are, in fact, two different rings?”

“Really? Blimey! Are you serious? I better get on that, hadn’t I?”

“Sarcasm fits you worse than that jumper.”

“Sherlock, why are we talking about this?”

“Because you have exactly one month before your wedding. And because it’s upsetting Mary, and you refuse to realize it. Understand, John, I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt by assuming you’re _refusing_ to see it. Because even _you_ can’t be dull enough to _actually not_ see it.”

“So that’s why she’s been off since Gretta got engaged.”

“Ah, the light of understanding shineth forth.”

“Shut it, you wanker. And get your coat, you’re coming with me. I don’t know pants about diamonds.”

“Which is precisely why you’re going to give her this.”

“Jesus, Sherlock! Did you steal this from a client?”

“Of course not, John. I never steal from clients.”

“Except that--”

“Yes, yes, except that one time. No. This was my grandmother’s ring. She willed it to me because I was always so fascinated by the carbon inclusion in the leftmost diamond. It looks like a butterfly when viewed through a jeweler’s loop.  I believe the words you are looking for are ‘thank you.’”

“Sherlock, thank you, obviously, but there is no way I can accept this from you.”

“...The carbon inclusion is minute. It’s quite... a valuable piece, John, I wouldn’t--”

“No, you madman. It’s stunning, absolutely amazing but it’s too--”

“If you say it’s ‘too nice,’ for Mary, I’ll beat you. I will beat you right here and now with that thing on my finger. And it will leave _marks_.”

“Of course not!”

“Good, that’s settled then.”

“It’s not. I can’t! It’s your grandmother’s ring, Sherlock. And what if-- what if you want it later for yourself-- Where are you going? Sherlock? What was that look for? Sherlock! Come back here... Oh, for the love of...”

“Let go of my arm, John. I’ll get my coat and we’ll go out and prove that you love Mary enough to find her the world’s smallest diamond, which is all you can afford.”

“Sherlock, stop. Please, just stop. Thank you. Really thank you. I’m sorry, I am. I’ve put my foot in it apparently, and I apologize. Just. Stop. Please. Just...I don’t understand.”

“Obviously.”

“So...explain. Please.”

“For God’s sake, John, I don’t even know what you don’t understand. It was a very straightforward offer. Even _Anderson_ \--”

“Now that’s a bit of a low blow. Sherlock? Not that I don’t-- Not that I’m not touched but it’s a bit...a bit extreme. And, uh. Why? It’s worth a fortune, I’m sure…”

“Why are you always so obsessed with _money_? This ring isn’t worth a fortune because I would never _sell_ it.  It is fucking _priceless_.”

“Then why would you _give_ it away?”

“Because. As a gift to you and Mary...well it’s not as if it would be really leaving the family. As such.”

“Sherlock. That’s. That's just. _God_.”

“So, we’re doing hugs now?”

“Absolutely. As of right now. Yes, we definitely are.”

“Is the length of the hug customarily commensurate with the size of the ring? No, John, don’t stop. I- it’s fine.”

 


	25. Chapter 25

The boys are sitting in chairs as I smash my way into the flat. I don’t know if it was the way I slammed the front door or the way I stomped up the stairs that is making them so obviously uncomfortable, and honestly? Don’t care. Not one bit. Because I just spent the _last three hours_ of my life cramming bits of identical-tasting confection into my mouth and I feel bloated and fat and still unsure about my ultimate decision.

The fact that I did all this while spending time with Gretta who took every chance she could find to flash that _goddamn_ stupid bauble on her finger around like it’s her fucking job is just the icing on my current cake of rage. So I’m making my boys uncomfortable. Good.

“Did the, uh. Cake? Taste good?” John asks.

I put the kettle down with unnecessary gentleness because if I shatter it before I get my cuppa, I will literally kill everyone.

“Fine,” I grind out.

“Did you. Decide? On the cake?” he asks tentatively.

“Yes.”

“Good. Um. What’s all _this_ then?” he asks, gesturing broadly to encompass me and the towering inferno of pique that surely must be billowing around me. Sherlock hisses, whether in warning or in laughter I do not know and can not be arsed to care.

“What do you mean? _This_?” I ask tightly.

“The, er. Are you angry?”

Sherlock groans elaborately before I can answer. “Gretta. John. She went with _Gretta_.”

John, if anything looks more confused, and I snap.

“Shut it, Sherlock. No need to go deducing my strop for John. He’d figure it out well enough on his own eventually.”

Sherlock goes from sitting to standing in a movement so swift and graceful that admiration replaces pique for a demonstrable fraction of a second and before I can blink, he’s in front of me, his hands grasping my arms lightly cocking his head down so he can meet my eyes.

“The stress of wedding planning and cake eating must be making you delusional.”

“Delusional?” I screech, twisting away, but he holds me firm. I find myself reviewing which of the thirteen ways to break this hold would be the most painful when he continues.

“Obviously. Only someone suffering from extreme delusions could ever think that the addition of a piece of jewelry could make that Gretta woman even approach your level of loveliness or worthiness.”

Oh.

“But in case you’d like to, you know, continue laboring under that delusion, we got you this,” John says, reaching around Sherlock’s shoulder with a box that contains what I swear is a huge chunk of crystallized sunset. "Well, actually Sherlock said-"

Sherlock groans indignantly, releases my arms and presses his knee into the back of John’s, shoving down hard on his shoulder, effectively knocking him to his knees.

“For Christ’s sake, do I have to do _everything_?” he mutters, rolling his eyes.

Sherlock’s hand still rests on his shoulder as John looks up at me from his knee and reaches for my hand. He doesn’t say anything. He’s already asked and I’ve already answered, but the question is still there in his eyes, in his perfect, gentle face. I smile and bite my lip and squeeze his hand and he slips the ring onto my finger. I can’t take my eyes off it.

“It was Sherlock’s grandmother’s,” John explains quietly, rubbing his thumb over my hand. “He...said he didn’t want it leaving the family.” I gasp, looking up quickly. Sherlock is staring at the ring on my finger, biting his lower lip, and it’s then that I notice how hard he’s actually gripping John’s shoulder. He raises his eyes to mine, finally.

“It looks lovely on you,” he says softly. “I told John this should be between you two, alone, but he insisted that, because I--” John reaches up with his other hand and claps it over Sherlock’s and he stills.

“I don’t know what to say,” I murmur. “It’s perfect. This...” I gesture at them, pulling John up off his knees and reaching for Sherlock, and they both fold into me, John on one side wrapping his arms around my waist and resting his chin on my shoulder and Sherlock on the other wrapping those long, fine arms around both of us, resting his cheek on my head. “This. Just this. Always. Thank you,” I finish quietly, wondering how in the hell I’m supposed to keep my heart from breaking through my ribs and flying out the window.

We stand there for a moment and something...happens. It’s not a change in posture, not a change in...anything really, but my heart starts hammering, and I can feel John’s pressed up against me, beating hard. Sherlock tightens his arms around us fractionally and freezes. Not just his movement, but his breath, his...everything, just freezes.

I meet John’s eyes and his pupils are blown wide, his lips slightly parted. I lean forward a fraction of an inch and kiss him, brushing my lips over his gently and slowly, and he tightens his hold around my waist with one hand, fisting his other in Sherlock’s shirt as he makes to move away.

I pull away from John, and he smiles and tilts his head ever so slightly towards Sherlock. I widen my eyes slightly and he nods, almost imperceptibly. I turn towards Sherlock and reach a hand up to cup his face, and he stills again, his wide eyes flickering between John and me before settling. He would never lean, never ask, so I rise up on my toes and plant a kiss just at the corner of his lips, feeling John’s hands quiver at my waist as my lips connect with that smooth patch of skin.

“Thank you, Sherlock,” I whisper against his cheek, withdrawing. “It means everything.” He blinks rapidly, smiles and tucks his chin in in a manner that is so…Johnish that it melts my heart.

The blasted kettle chooses that exact moment to start screeching, and John who is closest, pulls away to lift it from the flame.

“So, we’re doing kissing now,” Sherlock sniggers, turning towards the table. I stare down at the ring glittering in the warm light of the flat.

“Yeah, every time either of you are as brilliant as this gorgeous thing on my finger, we’re doing kissing.” I joke. John barks out a laugh, almost spilling boiling water all over the place and everything goes back to normal. Except that it doesn’t, I realize, feeling the weight on my finger as I grab cups and saucers for us. And that’s just _marvelous_.


	26. Chapter 26

I stiffen and my eyelids brush folds of cloth when they fly open. Can’t see. I choke down a verbal reaction to the intolerable sensation of metal probes inserted under my nails and toe nails, one after another. I will not give them the satisfaction of hearing me cry out, I vow privately to myself, forcing my muscles to relax.

The toe curling sensation of metal scraping under my nails is replaced by an equally repulsive one- the feeling of strange hands stroking intimately, firmly, along my arms and legs, rubbing some kind of...lubricant onto my skin. The smell of peace lilies evokes every hospital room and funeral home I’ve ever been in and I have to breathe through an onslaught of nausea.

“So tense. Relax- you’ll enjoy it if you just relax,” the velvety voice grates like sandpaper in my ears and I strive mightily to mentally superimpose the feeling of John’s hands on this man’s as he boldly strokes me. It isn’t working. His fingers are too long… too different. Sherlock then. Sherlock’s hands rubbing firm circles over my biceps and trapezius muscles, Sherlock’s fingers at the meridian points of my wrists and elbows.

There is no way out, no escape from the predicament into which I’ve idiotically inserted myself. So I can try, at least, to make it less repugnant. It’s surprisingly easy to imagine Sherlock stroking my skin. I imagine he’d be an inquisitive lover, wanting to explore and look at everything before…

“I think it’s working,” Janine’s voice drifts from my left. “Molly, I’m sure I just heard her moan.”

That’s _it_. I sit upright, pulling the cucumber, muddy, whatever the bloody hell mask from over my eyes and grimacing an apology at the masseuse and the lady doing god-knows-what with lacquer to my toes. She handles the reaction with equanimity, but I rather think I’ve put the masseuse into a strop.

“Not really my thing,” I snark at him, and he shrugs as if to say ‘your loss, I get paid no matter what.’ The cocked eyebrow may well mean ‘and you better tip well you manky bitch.’

“Oh, love, look, now you’ve ruined it,” Mrs Hudson says from the chaise lounge in the corner of our private room. She’s hardly recognizable, her face painted with more of this mud stuff and her normally fussy clothing replaced by a voluminous robe. She regards the progress on her nails with approval.

“Send him over here, then,” Janine laughs from where she’s reclined on a massage bench like mine. “I could do with another pair of long, strong fingers. My back you know,” she finishes and giggles, and it’s all I can do to keep from screaming.

Drowning in a sea of estrogen has never been high on my priority list, which is why I refused flatly to have a bridal shower.

This hen night, however, became a horrible inevitability as soon as Molly Hooper had mentioned it because refusing Molly would be the emotional equivalent of kicking an injured puppy. Additionally, it provides me with another chance to firm up my friendship with Janine. No point in _not_ working that angle, should whatever Sherlock comes up with prove insufficient.  

I’d seen her file on top of Sherlock’s workspace in the living room two months ago. It was the hair that caught my attention...long, cascading locks of raven hair.

I didn’t wonder what Sherlock’s interest in her was. I _didn’t_ pounce on the file and definitely _didn’t_ relax when I realized she was Magnussen’s PA or that she was one of a number of other files of people caught in his disgusting orbit, and if anyone tells you anything different, they’re _lying_.

I allow a little burst of smugness to warm me a bit as I reach for the sticky sweet concoction to my left whose only redeeming quality is the insane quantity of alcohol masked beneath its cloying facade.

After that hug-thing-whatever it was a few days ago, it’s ridiculously hard for me to think Sherlock would be interested in anyone else except for John at the moment. Let alone the vapid brunette currently melting into a massage table on my right.

I check my mobile. It’s only 16:00 hours. I have roughly seven more hours to go. I choke down another pull of the prissiest drink that ever prissied and abruptly abandon my plan to focus on wooing Janine. As soon as we hit dinner, I’m switching to scotch and becoming as incoherent as possible as quickly as possible.

~~~

“So, what you’re saying, Molly Hooper, is that. Is that you think that ahem. You think that Sherlock likes _gummi bears_?” I squeak, letting my head fall backwards and swirling the drink in my hand decadently, trying not to slosh it while I shake silently with mirth.

“Yup,” she says primly eyeing her martini before dissolving into giggles. “Let me tell you, ah hah. I’ll tell you how I know, shall I?” she asks.

Honestly, she never does or says anything without permission, even three sheets to the wind. And let me tell you. We are _sailing_. I nod and Janine makes something approaching coherent acceptance, and Molly breathes deep, apparently in an effort to marshal her scattered thoughts.  

“One day, at the lab, you know? At Barts? I had a bag open, because I had three autopsies in a row and the smell of the formaldehyde kind of...well it sticks in your throat, you know?  Gummy bears work to, ah, cover the taste?”

Janine makes a disgusted sound, but I nod for her to continue.

“Well, he came and, you know…” She stops talking, flips the collar of her blazer up and scowls doing as accurate representation of Sherlock swanning around a room as one can do from a deep leather seat in a posh pub.

I laugh, nodding my understanding, and she continues. “So, he comes in and passes by and, God, he _sniffs_ and does as good a double take as I’ve seen in years and makes this big show of interest in. In the ah. You know. Cadaver. And when I look down, half the gummies are gone. Just like that. And I said ‘Sherlock, you didn’t ever _steal my candy_ ,’ and he swallows them all at once to answer, but, like, chokes. And he’s glaring at me like it’s _my_ fault.”

It’s hilarious, because I can see it clearly in my drunken mind’s eye. I can actually see it. Molly’s clearly mad for him and that’s sad, but she copes magnificently, transmuting her unrequited love into the most loyal kind of friendship, and that endears her to me unimaginably.

“I don’t know why that’s so funny,” Janine sniffs. “He sounds like a tosser.”

“Oh, Christ, he is,” I agree nodding emphatically. “Trust me, I live with him.”

“So, what’s the attraction?” she asks coyly.

“You just...have to meet him.” Molly grimaces at her now empty cocktail, and I wave my arm languidly in the air until the gentleman who has the privilege of serving us cottons on. Molly and Janine order another each, and I order a beer. It’s time to slow down. Mrs. Hudson is long gone home (due to her hip, you know), but it was she who began the Tall Tales Of Sherlock that Molly and I have continued.

“Well, I’m to be your maid of honor, yeah? And he’s John’s best man? You know what they say…”

I manage a polite smile over my pint, relieved that Molly looks confused rather than upset. Fat chance, Janine. All of a sudden, her eyes focus on my hand like a laser.

“Oh, my God. HOW did I not notice that?” she squeals, and I grin despite myself. I’d grown used to the weight and hardly notice it anymore except when the light causes it to catch fire. Molly’s eyes have grown round and I shift uncomfortably, holding  my hand out and regarding the ring myself.

“It’s a family heirloom, apparently,” I say, devoutly hoping that’ll be the end of the discussion, but Janine raises her eyebrows.

“You’d never know John’s from money, the way he dresses,” she says with a wink, assuming erroneously that I’d change that if I could. Molly’s quiet sound of protest mollifies me enough that I don’t leave a ring shaped bruise on Janine’s face. It’s close enough that I could, she’s staring so hungrily at the diamonds.

“Actually, it was. Uh. Sherlock’s. Grandmother’s. Apparently,” I say, squirming slightly and searching Molly’s face. I see nothing there but delight and maybe a little wistfulness, and honestly, if one could magically become someone’s sister, I would right here, right now.

“Wow,” Janine says after a moment. “Well, if that’s the second best, I’d love to see the one he’s saving for himself!” I look at her quickly to see if she’s actually _trying_ to make me punch her, but it appears that she’s just quite the uncomplicatedly grasping type, so I let pity take the place of rage. Like she’d ever pull Sherlock anyway.

After another round, we decide to call it a night. The boys should be getting home soon from their own do anyway, and I’d love to see if Molly’s alcohol measurements worked out for them. If I know John, he’d started slipping shots in whenever he could. Oh, god, maybe Sherlock’s drunk. I feel the sudden intense need to see that happen all over the flat.

We sway out of the pub, shrugging into our coats and hats and whatnot and start walking towards the main drag to find a cab. Janine gets the first one, and we watch her drive away.

“She’s…nice?” Molly says uncertainly. I snort, stumbling gracefully to my right, and Molly links her arm with mine as we continue on our way. “Why don’t we share a cab,” Molly says. She sounds entirely too sober.

“Are we even going the same direction?” I ask, waving down a cab that’s already engaged. Christ, I’m legless.

“Um. I uh. I live on Marylebone?” she says. Really, is it a question? Wait...I stop and squint up at her blushing face.

“But that’s...right around the block from Baker Street!” I yell. She nods, looking embarrassed. “How? How long?”

“Years, actually.”

“Sherlock never said!” I feel betrayed in a comic kind of way.

“Er, I don’t think Sherlock knows.”

I stare at her, frowning, and she starts looking truly upset.  I quickly try to clear my face. “Sorry Molly, it’s just that...you’re a good friend and you. You helped him. And. Well, he should know. You know. Where you live.”

Molly looks like she’s about to crawl out of her skin, her face twisting into a horrible parody of a smile.

“It’s ok, Mary. He’s, you know. He’s Sherlock.”

I snort. Sherlock bought me a chair, and gave me a ring, and all I am is John’s fiancee, and here’s this woman who helped him die and come back to life, and he doesn’t even know where she lives.

“You and me, Molly. We’re going home. To Baker Street. For another drink. I insist.”

Molly grins and nods and next thing I know we’re falling into a cab. I don’t remember falling out again, but that’s probably because Molly helped me. By the time I got back to Baker street, I could barely find the keyhole and when I do, Molly gently informs me that I’m trying to insert lipstick into it. This causes no fewer than three minutes of hilarity before Mrs. Hudson opens the door and kindly pushes us up the stairs.

“The boys aren’t back from their case yet, so--”

“Case?” I ask, befuddled, all hope of drunk Sherlock fading abruptly. “Wasn’t it Stag Night?”

“Oh, is THAT why they were acting strangely,” Mrs. Hudson says, wrapping her dressing gown more firmly around her. “Oh dear.  Well, the stories should be interesting at least. If they remember them.  Good night, girls,”  she says, shuffling back down the stairs. Molly and I stare at each other for a moment.

“Drink?” I ask weaving my way over to the liquor cabinet.

“Oh, I don’t know…” she says, her eyes darting around the room as if expecting a drive-by insulting.

“Drink.” I say, handing her a glass of… something.

She smiles and sips and pulls a face and sips again. I realize we’re still standing, and gesture her to sit down. She picks my chair because it’s closest and I smile magnanimously, happy to share one of my favorite things with my magically created sister, and I sit in John’s chair.

“Hey, this is new!” Molly says, suddenly looking closer at the chair she’s sitting in. I smile and swig and hiccup and god, I am so drunk!

“Sherlock bought it for me when we moved in,” I blurt.

“Oh! Okay,” Molly says, and her voice is so small and falsely bright that it has the effect freezing cold water cascading through my stupid, sluggish brain. She’s stroking the arm of the chair with her hand, the one wearing her engagement ring (what’shisname? Tony? Tod? Tommy? Jesus, and I was mad at Sherlock for not knowing her _address?_ )

“Molly, that’s what made me so angry earlier. I-- Sherlock cares about me because he cares about John. This,” I waggle my ring finger and gesture around, knowing the truth as I say it and letting it bite.  “This is for John. And I love that he loves him so much. John’s like you. I’m not-- God, I’m drunk. What I’m saying is. He should….Sherlock should... _you_ should have a chair. All you’ve done for him? You should have a fucking cottage by the seaside with a very devoted, young, handsome handyman who says ‘as you wish’ and then fucks you into the mattress,” I say vehemently.

And Molly laughs. It’s not that little tinkling, nervous giggling thing she’s been doing all night. Laughter bursts from her chest. She throws her head back and she guffaws, she chortles, she _cackles_. It’s brilliant and I find myself laughing as well.

“Oh my,” she finally says, wiping tears from her eyes and convulsing as she tries to master herself. “Oh dear. Mary, I haven't laughed like that since-- I don’t know when,” she gasps. “I love that movie. But their accents!”

“Right?” I say and I’m unable to keep the smug satisfaction at how stellar _my_ accent is from rippling through me. I could have been an actor! I’d have been amazing. I’d have gotten BAFTAs and Oscars and.. Uh oh.

“Molly? You ok, love?”

“Oh! Yes? I’m fine. Just. Swallowed down the wrong pipe.”

“You’re an awful liar. What’ve I said?”

“No, nothing. It’s just. Um. This? This chair? And, you know. That? Your ring?”

“What about them?”

“They’re uh. Well. Not for John.” Molly screws her face up again, and I can’t tell if she’s about to start laughing or crying. “See, thing is. I’ve been friends with Sherlock a long time...even if he doesn’t know that’s what we were before...before _that thing_ I helped him do. I’ve been _his_ friend anyway. For a long time. And he...I mean he looks at you.” She meets my eyes, and hers are wide and earnest, but I can’t quite understand...

“I mean, I do _live_ with him. Impossible as that is to imagine managing.” I try for levity, but it falls flat. She looks a little frustrated, and a little sad and twists her hands in her lap.

“No, I mean he _looks_ at you. The way he looks at John. And, I know, maybe better than most, that he only looks when he actually, um. Cares. A lot. Like, _a lot_.”

I’m drunk, but I’ve always been a good listener. So I listen to what Molly isn’t saying, and it breaks my heart for her, but right there, alongside the pain is a burning joy. Because maybe she’s right. She would know the signs, having searched for them for so long herself.

“Molly,” I start, frowning.

“No, see, now I’ve done it. Ruined our fun. I’m sorry, it’s really none of my business… I’ll just--”

“Oh you. Sit down. Please. You haven’t ruined anything. I’m not sure you’re right but--”

“I’m right. And you, um. You don’t have to worry about me, you know? Sherlock and I understand one and other. Really well actually. Now. After. After _that_. We...It might have been nice for a while, you know? But in the end, it would have hurt. I know that. He wouldn't have meant it to, but he would have-- But John. And you too, because you’re a lot like him, did you know that? In a good way though. In a-- you way. You and John _handle_ him. You can...I don’t know I sound silly. But please, if you don’t...If you don’t feel that way about him, just. He can delete it, probably, if it’s not gone too far. And it’s complicated, but he does hurt, you know. He can hurt, I mean. And…”

“Molly, I won’t hurt him, I promise you. I’ll do whatever I can to keep him happy. Maybe between all three of us, four if you count Mrs. Hudson, we’ll manage.”

Molly nods, smiling in relief, and rises.

“It’s really late…” she says. I nod, putting my drink on the table and walking her to the door. She pauses.

“I’m sorry if I--”

“Nope! We have to work on this apologizing when you’re not wrong thing.. no, don’t apologize! I’m happy you came out tonight. And thank you for… just thank you. For everything,” I say and hug her awkwardly. Actually, I hug her amazingly, I’m great at hugs, and she hugs me back awkwardly and sees herself down the stairs and through the front door.

Molly Hooper.

Damn.

The floor looks tantalizingly comfortable as I turn away from the door, but I make it to the couch to preserve my dignity. 


	27. Chapter 27

Nope. Nope! Sunlight bedamned. I pull a pillow over my eyes and decide to spend the rest of the day curled against my pregnant wife’s back. I smile to myself, laying my hand lightly over the soft skin of her belly and sigh.  It’s been somewhat hard to cope with the occasional stabs of euphoria that have been washing over me after Sherlock’s revelation.

Sherlock. Fuck.

_John Watson, you fucking idiot_ , I berate myself again.  On the cab ride back home, I'd traced back events to the exact moment when I cocked everything up with my best mate. “There are limits,” I’d said. I’d _meant_ limits regarding my dubious ability to dance with one partner, let alone two,  but I can’t fault Sherlock for taking that badly. Not after his...God that _speech_. If anyone who was in that room still operates under the delusion that that man is an actual sociopath, they’re dumber than Anderson _lobotomized_.

_‘The two people who love you most in the world,’_ he’d said. Who actually says words like that, in that order? He’s like a walking nineteenth century novel for Christ’s sake. And I-- god. I _teased_ him. Behind closed curtains indeed. If only.

I groan, realizing that I don’t, in fact, deserve this lazy lie in, or possibly the love of the man probably suffering from a terrible hangover beneath me, and haul myself from the bed, inadvertently disturbing Mary.

“Going to check on His Nibs,” I say. “Sleep, love.” Her lips curl up into a sleepy smile and my heart hammers. I hope devoutly our child takes after her.

“Don’t make it worse, love,” She murmurs, nuzzling the pillow and sighing back to sleep. I snort to myself and resolve to try my damnedest.

“Morning, Sherlock.” I say, shuffling into the parlor.

Sherlock almost leaps from the sofa where he’d been staring at something in a file. He’s still wearing pieces of his tuxedo from yesterday, and his hair is pressed up on one side. The afghan I’d thrown over him last night lay in a puddle at his feet.

“John! I didn’t...you’re here. You should be...not here. Shouldn’t you?”

“We decided to come home. You know. Rather than stay there.”

A groan elaborate even for Sherlock ushers me into the kitchen.

“ _Why_? Also, I didn’t even hear you come in.” This last bit was puzzled. I realize Sherlock’s woken up having figured something out in his sleep and gone straight into research mode. I put the kettle on and when I look back in, he’s picking confusedly at his clothing, and both our eyes meet on the empty whiskey bottle next to the table.

“Oh.” he says.  “Must have deleted that,” His face is pale and his eyes are red rimmed and sunken.

I kick myself a third, fourth and fifth time for the ‘limits’ comment and bring him out a glass of water and paracetamol and flop down on the couch next to him.

“Why’d you leave the wedding early?” I ask quietly knowing why and hoping he’ll give me a chance to apologize.

“...It seemed the right thing to do at the time.” he snaps, rolling his eyes.

“Are you alright with...you know nothing changes, really.” I grasp at what I think might be lying underneath, but I’m pants at this, and I know it.

“I’m fine, John,”

“You don’t look fine.”

“I am. Fine. Case,” he says, hefting the file before downing the water and pills in one swallow and returning his attention to the file. I hear a thump upstairs and get up to make tea, deciding at the last minute that a pot of the strong stuff is in order.

Mary stumbles into the room just as I bring it back to the sofa table and resume my place next to Sherlock. She makes a happy noise and flops down between us, shoving us both further against opposite sides.

“Pregnant lady, make way!” she shouts, wiggling under Sherlock’s arm and tucking her bare feet under my thigh. I brace for a fit of Sherlockian Pique, but all he does is sigh and shifts slightly into a more comfortable position, propping his feet up on the table.

“Now we’re doing cuddling, it seems.” His tone is resigned but the smile tugging his lips up is anything but.

“Pregnant women need cuddling. They also need their husbands to mix them sweet tea. And they need their detectives to figure out where they’re supposed to fit a cot in this place.”

Sherlock stiffens, and his eyes widen.

“You want…” He stops, glancing sidelong out of his eye at me as Mary leans her head against her shoulder. “Here?” he breathes.

Mary pulls back from him, staring at his face which is by this point, unreadable. Her eyes dart to mine, widening.

“Sherlock?” I start, seeking his eyes.  “We thought-” I realize suddenly the utter selfish insanity of what Mary and I gigglingly discussed, cuddled together in our bed last night. In the harsh light of day this is 221 B Baker Street, complete with experimental chemicals in the kitchen, human heads in the fridge, case files over everything and the occasional harpoon.

Mary and I moving in had been relatively noninvasive, but a baby would change every part of this place. I can see Mary coming to the same conclusions and she presses her eyes shut for a moment before opening them again, her face changing abruptly. She smiles brightly and turns back to Sherlock.

“No worries, love,” she says, and his eyes snap down to hers. “We’ll find a place close by. I can’t imagine what a baby could get up to with your chemistry set. Of course you wouldn’t want--”

“ _I_ wouldn’t want?” Sherlock exhales, cutting her off. “How can _you_ think...” He drifts off, his eyes darting around the room before jumping off the couch, shoving Mary rather roughly as he does, and striding swiftly to his room.

“What the hell?” I hiss, reaching out to her. She looks like she’s about to cry, and even for Sherlock, this is _too much_.

“John, it’s fine,” she says as I lurch off the couch.

“Bloody well isn’t,” I growl heading after Sherlock. I can hear her following me. I throw the door to Sherlock’s bedroom open and he yelps from behind it.

“John!” he barks and pokes his head around the door. “What are you doing?”

“I could say the same-- What’s that?”

“A measuring tape of course. What, are you blind? This room’s thirty percent larger than the one upstairs, so we’ll just switch.”

“What?” Mary says from behind me.

“We’ll switch rooms! Does pregnancy affect your hearing as well? I’ll have to look into that...”

“Sherlock, slow down. What are you talking about? Why are we switching rooms?”

“Because I didn’t think you’d want to have to run down the stairs every time you have to heat a bottle or change a..nappy or whatever you do with babies when they wake in the middle of the night. Obviously. I’ll move the lab stuff down to 221C, been meaning to do that anyway. Not enough room up here now that you have all those pans and whatnot hanging around, _Mary_ ,” he says narrowing his eyes at her accusingly.

“You mean my baking stuff?” She squeaks. Sherlock nods emphatically, brushing by us through the kitchen and onto the landing.

“Baby gates,” he says.

“Baby gates.” I repeat, feeling my eyebrows recede probably into my hairline. “You haven’t deleted baby gates?”

“Don’t be stupid, John. Classic clue. Everyone remembers to lock the door after them but no one remembers to close the baby gates after they murder. Closed room murder becomes open room murder. Less interesting, to be sure, but more accurate.”

Mary’s smile lights up the hallway.

“Just to be clear, Your Nibs, you are indeed saying you want us and our squalling baby living in this place with you?”

Sherlock spins around, his face a study in frustration.

“What have I _ever_ done to suggest otherwise, Mary?” he demands, gesturing wildly, before shoving back past us into the parlor and pacing rapidly between the chairs and couch.

“Granted, this kind of thing is not my area,” he rants as we follow him in.  “But I honestly can not fathom a _single other way_ I can prove you that you both belong here.” He stops, facing away from us and scrubs his fingers over his eyes. I cast a helpless glance at Mary. I don’t know what to say. Sherlock in a strop is no strange thing, but this...I’ve no idea how to deal with this.

Mary reaches forward and gently rests a hand on his shoulder and he inclines towards her touch.  “I didn’t think to be able to _keep_ you,” he says hoarsely. “After everything.”

“Oh, Sherlock,” she whispers, and there are tears in her voice.

This. It’s too much for me, this. The past few days and the wedding, and that speech-- It’s too bloody much. There are things that need to be said, that have gone unsaid for too long and they are _hurting_. To hell with this. Life is too fucking short. I draw myself up.

“Sherlock,” I say. The tone in my voice causes both of them to turn. His expression is open and so...broken.  I can read it like a book, maybe for the first time since I’ve met him. It hurts to see the desperation there, the need and the fear. The signs I’ve missed. Seen, but not observed. _Never again_. Mary’s eyes widen and her lips lift ever so slightly.

“You said. At the reception, during your speech, you said I sat between to the two people who loved me most in the world.” He nods, and I imagine I see him trembling. “Did it-- did it not occur to you that the same is true in reverse?” I glance at Mary and catch her eyes which are lighting up like the sun. Sherlock’s staring at me with a disconcerting intensity and I soldier on. Why is this so bloody hard?

“What I’m trying to say is that I...we. Goddamn it, I’m rubbish at this.” I grind out, taking a step forward and halting again fisting my hands at my sides. “It’s not a matter of keeping us, Sherlock. You can’t ever get _rid_ of us. I hope. Ever.” Sherlock’s eyes widen and seem to search my face.

“John, _tell him_.” Mary says quietly, and Sherlock’s breath hitches, and it’s like a mooring line’s cut loose. I close the distance between us and stand close, reaching a hand behind his neck and pulling his head down until our foreheads touch.

“I love you, you madman. We love you- so much. You can keep us as long as you want us. Forever, I hope.” Sherlock doesn’t move or breathe, and anxiety filters cold through the warmth in my chest.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Mary mutters and shoves me hard, right between the shoulder blades and I rocket into Sherlock, hitting his nose with my forehead.

The impact is the equivalent of an on switch. Sherlock rocks backwards and then forwards, twining long arms around me and pulling me close. My thighs press against his and I tighten my grip on his neck slide my other hand around his slim waist, letting my head fall forward to rest in the hollow of his shoulder. He drifts long, gentle fingers through my hair and that’s _heaven_ and he cradles my head against him and I melt with a sigh that I’ve been holding in for _years_.

His lips brush my hair over the crown of my head as he murmurs something unintelligible-- I feel the words as a reverberation through his chest rather than hearing them distinctly. Evidently the they were for Mary’s benefit rather than mine.  She laughs, and a more delighted sound I don’t think I’ve ever heard.

“Limits indeed,” she scoffs. “John can be an wrong once in a while, you know. There will be no limits between us anymore.” I barely hear her because Sherlock’s carding his fingers through my hair again and the beat of my own galloping heart in my ears overwhelms almost everything else.

He is so… slight. All wiry and warmth and strength…I could wrap my arms around his waist and grip my own elbows if I tried. Instead, I stroke my fingers into the soft curls at the nape of his neck. He draws a shuddering breath and sways against me as I drag my fingertips up and down his neck and my heart skips wildly at the muted moan that works its way out of the vibrating cavern of his chest.

He strokes through my hair again, sliding his other hand from the small of my back to my throat and gentle fingers caress my jaw and tilt my head back. My eyes slide open (when had they closed?) His are dark and hooded. His beautiful mouth opens slightly and I get a glimpse of pink as the tip of his tongue darts over his lips just before they brush ever so lightly over mine. I still as every neuron in my brain devotes itself to memorizing that soft, tentative touch.

He dips down again, gliding gently, and I open for him, humming as the sweet, wet heat of his tongue laves my lips. I pull him closer, deepening the kiss, fisting my hand into his shirt at the small of his back as his coils tighter into my hair.

He tastes like tobacco and whiskey and tea, and I could die happy here, in this wet velvet, undulating world of his lips and tongue.   

“Ah, _John_ ,”  he purrs as he breaks the kiss, his fingers ghosting down my neck and tracing the curve of my clavicle until they come to rest over the pulse point over my carotid artery where they linger, measuring. His eyes shine, and he grins down at me, delighted.

“Jesus, Sherlock,” I breathe, grinning back, and he chuckles, and we turn together towards Mary whose face is practically splitting, her smile is so wide. Sherlock reaches out and snags her hand, pulling her against him and she throws her arms around us both.

“This,” Sherlock says with an air of happy certainty, “is going to be _brilliant_.”  


	28. Chapter 28

File: Voltaire

Status: Password Protected

Case Notes:

John and Mary have unexpectedly supplied me with sufficient data to makes further experiments performed for the purpose of ascertaining the level of their feelings for me unnecessary.

The data was delivered by John in the form of an undeniable and straightforward avowal of both his love* and Mary’s, and their intention to continue to strengthen their attachment to me inevitably necessitating the inverse.

Mary additionally removed any doubt as to their intentions to pursue a relationship with me outside the normal social norms of monogamy. It remains only to be seen what form this relationship will take and how quickly it will manifest itself. I intend to significantly contribute to these outcomes though this is, admittedly, not my area.

Recent research in the area of stable relationship building has unearthed an unseemly amount of documentation both on and offline, the majority of which is specious, illogical and inane. There seems to be no conclusive or scientifically valid algorithm or formula to follow that guarantees a positive outcome.

I feel that my eventual contribution of such will likely outweigh the more formidable and interesting contributions I have made in the areas of forensic science, if only because of the wider demographic of interested people.

Based on my observations of other relationships*, it seems that the most successful are built gradually over time manifesting through a series of increasingly sentimental and emotional displays of affection culminating in a marriage ritual of some type.

In direct opposition, unsuccessful romantic relationships seem to fall apart due in equal parts to incompatibility (not at issue here) and artificially hurried pacing or ‘Rushing In.’

The metamorphosis from platonic to erotic love that John and I have undergone seems to have taken place over the requisite amount of time, and were we to form a romantic and physical relationship immediately it seems likely that it would have a high probability of success.

However, the addition of Mary to the equation is problematic, certainly not because of incompatibility, but because of the comparative brevity of our acquaintance. We have not had sufficient time for our feelings, platonic or erotic, to establish themselves anywhere approaching the extent necessary to facilitate a successful, stable relationship.

In addition, it has been brought to my attention by Molly (who has begun demonstrating perspicuity beyond her previous abilities, attributable, no doubt, to continued association with myself) that Mary is operating under the misapprehension that my affection for her stems solely from my utter devotion to her husband. It behooves me to disabuse her of this ridiculous notion as quickly as possible.

Thus, I am left with two alternatives:

1\. to allow sufficient time to pass for my relationship with Mary to naturally progress to the point at which we have a chance of forming the long lasting and beneficial relationship we both deserve, or

2\. to make a concerted effort to accelerate the process without crossing the invisible line into “Rushing Into” the relationship.

No one has ever accused me of having an excess of patience and now that my arms have finally embraced that which my heart holds most dear, and my lips have sampled the absolute embodiment of human perfection, I have even less, so of course I have already chosen the latter.

In the interest of full disclosure, impatience does not begin to describe my state of being at the moment.  The physical display of the sentiment that has been held so tightly in check for so long seems to have released something volatile within me.

The desire for more, _now_ , to have everything immediately, to touch and taste and memorize every inch of John’s body and catalogue every single sound that results from ministrations the thoughts of which have deprived me of sleep for years, is not dissimilar to the distraction of extreme addiction.  

Over two days after the event, I am still trying to master an almost Pavlovian response to close proximity, which manifests as shortness of breath and an excruciatingly intense hyper-sensitization of the senses.

Every brush of their fingers, every innocent point of contact we make as we orbit around each other has acquired added meaning. I feel as though we are not so much moving about the flat as performing a complex dance of carefully planned steps each executed with the intent to attract or solicit more.

The knowledge that this is the result of a complex yet easily explained chemical reaction in my brain does nothing to lessen the effects which, if I am to be honest, are far from unpleasant. However, it does make ‘taking one’s time’ extremely difficult, and yet to engage in further displays of affection with John would seem to be potentially hurtful to Mary until our relationship progresses to the point at which such displays are also permissible with her.

I find the idea of hurting Mary in any way is so repugnant as to be mildly physically nauseating.  It is wholly irrational to feel such protectiveness for someone who can so clearly and ably take care of herself and yet is not an irrationality in which I am in any way opposed to indulging.

Thus, the task is now to find the correct mix of ingratiating commentary, gifts and sexual seduction.*

It’s not my area, but I’m a quick study. I’m a genius, after all. I will turn this ‘wooing’ into an art form. Neither deserves anything less..

  
  


***Fondness+Attraction < Love ????? **

***Small, subject pool of limited statistical significance, must rely on empirical data.**

** *They call this ‘wooing.’ What kind of a word is that? “Wooing’ indeed. **


	29. Chapter 29

“John.”

“Yes love?”

“Have you….noticed anything odd lately? Concerning Sherlock?”

“Other than the fact that he’s taken to leaning on us like a felled tree every chance he gets? You were right about that, by the way, ta."

“Yes, aside from that. When’s the last time you went out for milk?”

“...Last week. Thought you’d picked some up.”

“Nope. How about hoovered the living room?”

“You mean that wasn’t you? What about Mrs. Hudson?”

“Nope, it was done this morning...she’s visiting her sister.”

“You’re telling me. You’re telling me that Sherlock has...Surely not.”

“He absolutely has.”

“Mary, that’s...it’s impossible.”

“He also told me last night that, and I quote, ‘Your eyes are the precise color of litmus paper dipped in a 40% base solution.’”

“I think...that’s a compliment?”

“Considering the fact that he was, well, cradling my face in his hands at the time, I would assume so.”

“Mmm, I’m a bit jealous.”

“Says the man whom he compared to Achilles the day before…”

“Hah, as though I could forget that. You’re right, something’s up. Bugger. Sherlock on his best behavior can only mean one thing…I’ll call Molly and make sure he hasn’t, I don’t know, blown up a corpse or something.”

“John, I don’t think he’s covering. I think, heh. I think Sherlock’s trying to, uhm...woo us. For lack of a better term.”

“...You’re not serious.”

“Serious as the heart attack I’m pretty sure you’re going to suffer the next time he strokes your hair.”

“I love Sherlock, Mary, but I think you might be reading into it a bit much...I don’t think the word ‘wooing’ is in his vocabulary. But even if he is, it’s only--I mean. Why? I think, um. I made my position amazingly clear the other day when we. You know.”

“Don’t I ever. If all I can ever do is just watch you two snog each other senseless I will die a happy, incredibly horny woman.”

“Judging by the way he undresses you with his eyes every time you walk into a room, I’m fairly sure you won’t be punted to the sidelines.”

“Does he?”

“Trust me, I’ve known him a long time.”

“Still, he’s holding back with you because of me.”

“Isn’t that… I mean isn’t that right? You’re-- you should be…”

“Oh, I know. But you two...you’re going to drive each other mad now that it’s all out in the open. You’ll...It’s not good, you two wanting so much and waiting. I won’t be the cause of the resentment that’s going to cause eventually.”

“Mary, I--”

“Which is why I’ve booked Molly and I a shopping weekend in Paris starting Friday.”

“You don’t have to do this.”

“I know, my love, but frankly, watching you two dodge each other? It’s driving me as mad as it’s driving you two. The tension in this place is choking me. So do us all a favor and sort yourselves out this weekend. If I come back to an un-shagged husband, I’ll shoot you both.”

“In that case…”

“And you’re thanking me now...you might not after you check our bank balance after this weekend. Maternity clothing is expensive if you don’t want to look like tweedle dee.”

“Mary, you will never look like Tweedle Dee no matter how pregnant you are.”

“Oh, thanks love, that means--”

“More a Tweedle Dum type, aren't you, what with your-- OW!”


	30. Chapter 30

John hears the door below open and slam shut and folds the paper he’s been reading. Sherlock’s taking the stairs two at a time. _Case_.

“Case!” Sherlock gasps from the doorway where he braces himself.

“Christ, did you _run_ from the museum?” John asks, grinning a bit. Mary’s been gone for exactly one hour and their two week long dry spell chooses that moment to end itself. John smirks. She’ll be pissed to have missed an opportunity.

“Close. Traffic’s a mess. Come _on_ John, I’ll explain from the cab,” Sherlock says before whirling in a cloud of coat and clattering back down the stairs. John sighs and snags his coat as he passes through the door, but pauses on the landing.

Stairs two at a time, ran almost all the way from the museum...No text from Lestrade, so this is a private client’s case-- no expectation of backup… John takes the stairs to his room two at a time and quickly locates the locked box he keeps his sig in checks the clip and takes it with him.

“So, what’s the story, Sherlock?” he asks as they enter the cab. It’s the midst of the worst evening traffic and Sherlock drums his fingers impatiently after giving the cab a cross street near Barts.

“A year ago we had a closed room theft of a diamond necklace and a jeweled coat of arms brooch. Do you recall the circumstances?”

“Yeah. The Case of the Kerr Calamity.”

“Not interested in your ridiculously alliterative blog post titles. And I _did_  ask you not to write about the unsolved ones.”

“Someone has to keep your ego in check, you wanker. So, what, are you telling me you picked up a lead after all this time?”

“Do you remember the nature of the security breach?”

“Yeah, uhm. Whoever stole the jewels overloaded the circuits on the saferoom door. But that caused the metal bolt on the door to heat up and, well, ostensibly the bloke burned himself pretty badly when he went to get out.”

“Woman.”

“What?”

“Not a ‘bloke.’ A woman.”

“DNA from the skin left on the bolt was inconclusive.” John says, puzzled.

“Yes, but such a burn would have left a very distinctively shaped scar.” Sherlock muttered, staring out the window. John sighed and waited, knowing it was useless to rush him. Finally, Sherlock turned to him and his eyes practically glittered in the twilit cab.

“Molly called me just before absconding with your wife to Paris. A woman with a very odd scar on her left hand arrived at the morgue a few hours ago.”

John smiled.

“She remembered the description from all that time ago. Gotta love Molly. But why are we going now? No one else ever lets you into the morgue. We’ll have to wait till she gets back.”

“By which time, whatever incompetent idiot they get to fill in for her will have mutilated it and botched the autopsy. No, John, we need to see that body before it’s been further disturbed. Honestly, John, your wife has the absolute worst timing,” Sherlock snaps.

John tucks his chin in holding on hard to his patience. “Mary and Molly deserve their holiday,” he says slowly.

“Yes, fine, but why _this_ weekend?” Sherlock demands petulantly, and John shoots him a look. He’s glaring out the window again, his fingers drumming on his knees.

“Why _not_ this weekend?” John hazards.

“Because. I had _plans_.”

John blinks trying to assimilate this rather alarming statement.  Running the events of the past day through his head, he realized there were some...anomalies.  

When Mary’d mentioned her intentions, Sherlock had reacted...oddly. Insofar as he’d had a reaction at all. He’d scowled at her and demanded she reschedule, and she laughed and went off to pack, leaving him muttering and storming around the kitchen for a bit before scooping up his laptop and taking it off to his bedroom where he had, John assumed, engaged in a massive sulk.

John smiled to himself. Sherlock hadn’t bothered deducing the reason why Mary had up-and-outed so precipitously, and John had been having a wonderful time imagining different versions of how he would enlighten Sherlock. He sighed. The case would get in the way, but there was a good chance Sherlock’d solve it in time for them to have a chance to--

“John!” Sherlock says sharply, jerking him back into the present abruptly.

“Oi. No need to yell. What?”

“I was asking if you have any interest in music, other than when I play it,” Sherlock growled.

“Uh. Yes? I guess. Depends on the sort.”

“What sort do you prefer?” John shrugs, mystified at this unexpected line of questioning and a bit miffed that they even had to _have_ this conversation after so many years of cohabitation. Sherlock’s propensity to delete information he didn’t think was essential was, occasionally, exasperating.

“I don’t know. Depend on my mood. I like the Beatles, uh. Pink Floyd occasionally. The Killers if I’m in the mood.”

Sherlock shakes his head in disgust. “I have no idea what language you’re speaking at the moment, but it’s of no consequence. I had made plans to take Mary to a concert tomorrow evening, and I was going to return the tickets but, though it’s clear you don’t have her appreciation of actual music, I doubt the result will be satisfactory. Honestly. The Killers? What the hell sort of name is that for an ensemble?”

“Wait, let me get this straight Sherlock. You were going to take Mary. To a concert. That you-- hah. I’m sorry.  That you planned for in advance to enough to buy tickets?”

Sherlock shifts uncomfortably and glares down his nose at John.

“Yes. I am given to understand that it is customary to take someone with whom one is romantically involved to quasi-social events that one thinks they would enjoy. Am I mistaken?”

John could only shake his head.

“Mary particularly enjoys when I play Brahms, and the LSO is performing Brahms 1st symphony of which I’m quite fond. It seemed like the concert and dinner beforehand would be appropriate, especially considering the most culturally important event you’ve ever taken her to was the RAF Airshow.  But she had to schedule this...this shopping weekend with Molly, so it’s moot,” Sherlock grinds out, clearly more frustrated than he wants to admit.

“Sherlock, mate, you should have told her. Hell, If I call her now and tell her what you had planned, she’ll damn well turn the bloody train around and force them to take her back here.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, John. She’s three quarters of the way to Paris by now. I’m sure she’ll have a fine time draining our bank accounts buying clothing to accommodate her expanding waistline,” Sherlock grumbles. “At least she has the sense to go to Paris to buy the necessary maternity wear. Everything I’ve seen in British stores is more horrid than your Faire Isle jumper.”

“Um, Sherlock. If you want-- Wait, you’ve been looking at maternity wear? Actually? No. Just. Don’t answer that.” John halts his rush and regroups the troops.  “Thing is, I was going to Greg’s to watch the match, but I could you know, throw him over. You were clearly looking forward to this. I could. Go. With you,”  John says, knowing he’s likely letting himself in for a shower of sarcastic scorn. Instead, Sherlock just shakes his head, firming his jaw.

“Not your area.”

“I don’t even know that ‘cause I’ve never been. But it’s your area. And part of… you know. This. Is indulging in your loved one’s interests,” he says. “Besides which , since when have you ever minded dragging me off to do things I don’t want to do?” John finishes, a hint of a smile in his voice.

“S’not the same thing at all, John. That’s for the Work. This is...different. I don’t want you to go if you don’t want to go. That would defeat the purpose as I understand it,” Sherlock murmurs.

Out of habit John suppresses the urge to reach for Sherlock’s hand, then smiles to himself and lays his hand on Sherlock’s where it rests on his thigh, feeling a little stab of joy that this is allowed now. Sherlock immediately curls his fingers around John’s and he glances at John sidelong out of the corner of his eye.

“John?” he asks, his lips curving upwards. “Would you accompany me to dinner and Brahms tomorrow night?”

Sherlock could have asked if him if wanted to jump into a pit of poisonous scorpions, John decides. The answer would be the same. He smiles.

“I would like nothing better. Assuming we’ve solve the case by then.”

Sherlock grins and leans towards John until soft curls brush his forehead. “Fuck the case, John Watson,” he rumbles, his lips grazing John’s cheek. “We’re going to the symphony.”

Sherlock pulls away, gently disengaging his fingers from what has become John’s death grip as they pull up to their stop and John finds himself juggling a welter of inconvenient physical reactions as he struggles to extricate himself from the cab, not the least of which is a very noticeable tightness in his trousers.  

_Get it together, Watson, you’re not a fucking teenager anymore. Curls and a whisper should not be able to...bugger._

He notices Sherlock smirking, having correctly deduced John’s physical state and his influence on it as he sweeps away towards Barts.

John smiles to himself as he follows Sherlock. He’s not a competitive man, John Watson, not generally speaking. But this….this minor act of what he can only term seduction, is tantamount in his mind to a gauntlet thrown. John throws back his shoulders and tugs on his jumper, straightening the lines of his clothes and his body. If Sherlock wants to pitch this little battle, he’ll be sorry he ever went up against Three Continents Watson. 

Well, he amends to himself, sorry probably isn’t the right word. Hopefully.


	31. Chapter 31

It takes a bit to find the right body in the honeycomb of freezer compartments at Barts, and it doesn’t help that they dare not turn on the lights. At least until utterly necessary. Sherlock scowls as they open one drawer after another.

Molly’s absence rankles. The fact that he has not been granted unfettered access after so many years of what can only be termed service rankles. The fact that John is ten whole meters away on the other end of the room rankles. The fact that the transport has been compromised lately rankles, especially now, when he needs to harness his faculties to aid in his powers of observation. He should have been able to tell which bloody drawer the bloody body was in the moment he stepped in the room, but was distracted by the light touch of John’s shoulder as he passed by him in the doorway.

“Sherlock, I think I found her,” John’s voice, low and quiet still echoes around the room and Sherlock’s skull. He shakes his head once, hard, trying to dislodge the velvet drape that is John’s voice from where it twines around his mind, muffling his senses.

John has pulled out a drawer and is examining its contents by torch light, gloved hands lifting arms and examining. Sherlock is momentarily arrested by the sight of his face fading out of the surrounding darkness, the small spill of light from the focused beam in his hand limning the outline of his features with flickering clarity, etching them in high contrast.

John’s eyes, when he raises from the body that separates them, them glitter darkly. The outlined plains of his face shift subtly. Nostrils flair, lips retract, his jaw hardens and what moments before had been an expression of mild scientific curiosity is now a study, a fucking master class in predatory attention and it’s only by the force of his almost indomitable will that Sherlock’s footsteps remain steady, that his breathing does not alter as he approaches this wolf in a jumper. He can almost feel John’s teeth grazing his neck and his resolve falters, but there she is, palm upturned, the oddly shaped scar matching the size and shape of the bolt precisely. Except…

“She didn’t get treatment for this,” John says, wolf gaze traveling down the line of the torch beam, stroking his gloved finger over the hard, nubby tissue of the scar. Sherlock nods, frowning, struggling to redirect the runaway train of his thoughts back onto the rails of logic and deduction. The scar… The scar would have impeded the finer movements of the hand. ( _Brilliant deduction Sherlock. For God's sake, get it together._ )

A thief as good as this woman must have been would not have risked that unless... it was possible that he had mistaken her commitment to the trade, or her dependence on it. He shakes his head again, unable to blot John’s proximity from his perception.  He wonders how in hell a bloody expression could be so intensely distracting.

“John, get the lights. I’ll only need a moment once I can see her,” he growls. John smirks as he turns away, and after a moment the air is no longer redolent with the scent of his soap and aftershave. The lights slam on, and data begins to flow.

_Cat owner.  Younger sister of an older brother.  Single, no children hates parents likes women repressed attraction professional competent serial thief for…hire. Works on commission for a fence. Clothing, black, skin-tight. Found at scene of new theft, fell from a height,_

“Sherlock, someone’s coming,” John says from his position by the door. Sherlock only vaguely hears him.

_Close, so close_. _Fell from a height. Eight meters up, rope burns on hands-- stealing something set into a wall, something religious judging by the location, something small, very small very easy to overlook relic old ancient even... ah._

Sherlock cards his fingers through the woman’s thick hair and shakes them lightly. A small blue orb on a string attached to a clip falls from where it had been clipped into the hair above her right ear. Clever woman. Not clever enough. Of course the Yard had missed it. Anderson’s bloody incompetence is useful for once.  

“Sherlock!” John snaps, and Sherlock quickly slips the orb into his coat pocket, rearranges the woman’s limbs and shoves the drawer in and slams the door before dropping his phone on the floor and kicking it under one of the exam tables.

“Look at the floor!” he hisses to John just as the door opens on the other end of the room.

“Oi! You two! What d’you think you’re doing in here!” A surprised pathologist who must be new is glaring at them from the door. Sherlock ignores him for a moment, making a show of studying the floor around him before swooping down to collect his phone.

“Looking for this. Must have left it earlier today. Whole world’s on this thing, can’t abide not having it. Thought I’d pop around and see if I’d left it here. John, what are you _waiting_ for, I found it. Come _on_ ,”  Sherlock says, brushing the irate man out of his way and blowing through the door, John close on his heels.  

“Hey wait! How’d _you_ even get in?”  the pathologist demands as he braces himself on the door. Sherlock looks back over his shoulder and weighs his answer carefully. The man is petulant, the ‘you’ a pejorative, and Sherlock abruptly loses patience. He stops, and changes course so abruptly that John slams into him and grabs his arm to steady himself. Which is nice. He crowds right into the pathologist’s personal space and glares down his nose at him.

“Actually, that’s an excellent question. The door was unlocked and ajar, come to think of it. Molly Hooper would never have been so careless, so I can only assume you are her temporary replacement while she’s away. Very temporary, I should add, should I mention the fact that two civilians managed access to the morgue to your superior?  What’s your _name_ again?”

“Never mind,” the pathologist mutters, slinking through the door and shutting it firmly behind him.

John shakes with suppressed mirth and Sherlock slings and arm companionably around his shoulders as they proceed down the hallway and fingers the keycard he lifted off Molly months ago in his pocket.

“Coffee?” he asks John.

“Sure.”

 

 


	32. Chapter 32

The cafe is warm and crowded, but Sherlock can make sitting near him incredibly unpleasant, so they suddenly find themselves at a low table surrounded by an unoccupied cluster of sedan chairs in a corner.

“What’s all this about then?” John asks, hefting his coffee meaningfully.

“All what?” Sherlock says, ignoring his beverage in favor of the small blue orb clutched in his fingers.

“Coffee? And….sitting? During a case? You don’t think that’s worthy of a comment?”

“Wifi. Give me your phone.”

“Use your own phone!”

“I need to do a lot of typing and your phone has the better keyboard interface. Give it here,” Sherlock demanded, holding out one hand and pocketing the orb again.

John pulls his phone from his pocket and regards it for a moment before looking up at Sherlock, a lone eyebrow traveling slowly up his forehead.

“So, just so we’re clear, you’ve just admitted that my phone is better. After you gave me hell for choosing anything other than an iPhone, this is what you’re telling me?” he says, waving said phone around. Sherlock narrows his eyes.

“It is possible that one part of that monstrosity you barely fit in your back pocket may be slightly superior to my phone, yes. Now. Give. It. Here.”

“Sorry, Sherlock, but if you can’t convince me that you actually need it, I’m not sure let you waste my data-- gotcha.”

Frustrated with John’s pointless intransigence, Sherlock’d darted a hand out to snag the phone from John’s fingers only to find his wrist caught out of nowhere and his hand slammed down onto the table, pinned in John’s grip. Coffee cups rock precariously as he tries to extricate his hand only to find that John’s doesn't budge.

An odd, totally unexpected tingle lances away from his warming wrist down his arm and pools in his chest and belly. John’s strong. He twists his wrist experimentally again. Really strong. Incredibly, unexpectedly strong.

“So, when I asked you that day to punch me in the face…” Sherlock drawls, observing the slight whiteness in John’s knuckles and how totally, absolutely still his hand is.

“Pulled my punches, obviously,” John smirks.

“And the whole ‘I have bad days’ wrestling thing?”

“Messing about. Didn’t really want to mess you up. Irene called it. But, Sherlock Holmes,” John says, leaning across the table into Sherlock’s space. “ _Never_ doubt that I can take you down.” The tingling that has been pooling threatens to flood. Heart slamming against his ribs, Sherlock leans across the table, meeting John in the middle.

“I am suddenly very much looking forward to watching you try,” he purrs into John’s ear, gratified by the tremor that vibrates through their connected hands.

They ease back into their seats slowly, and John relinquishes his death grip on Sherlock’s wrist only to lift his hand, palm up, and stare at it.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” he says after a moment.

“What doesn’t?” Sherlock asks, finding his voice grown just a bit husky. He allows his hand to rest in John’s relaxed, fingers ever so slightly curved.

“I watch these fingers do the damnedest things,” John says, stroking Sherlock’s palm with his thumb. “Squeeze the perfect amount of solution out of a pipette, precisely hit every note of a beautiful song. Your fingers are like living calipers.”

“I had no idea you were observing them so closely.”

“Oh I pay an inordinate amount of attention to these,” John says, interspersing his fingers with Sherlock’s, spreading them wide.  “I’ve just gotten really good at hiding it. Even from you apparently. I’ve often wondered what else the lovely fingers would be able to accomplish...so precisely.” John continues, now stroking each digit between thumb and forefinger stroking from palm to fingertip and back again.

Sherlock regards their linked hands with wide-eyed incredulity, unable to fully understand how these innocuous touches can take on such erotic overtones based solely upon context. John’s ability to create physical metaphors out of simple touch is having the weirdly wonderful effect of throwing Sherlock’s sensory perceptions into overdrive.

Every stroke of John’s compact, calloused digits sends a shock of raw heat racing through Sherlock’s system. The intensity of which is totally disproportionate to the actual quality of the touch. The effect is mesmerizing.  Sherlock is jolted rather abruptly out of his reverie at the quiet sound of John chuckling.

“Just imagine,” he murmurs, relinquishing Sherlock’s hand, “If I can transform the great paragon of self control Sherlock Holmes into a quivering mass of blushing desire simply by stroking his fingertips, just imagine what I might be able to do with other areas of his anatomy. Being a doctor and knowing such things.”

Sherlock rallies manfully and manages a throaty grunt.

“I have an incredible imagination, John, which you’ve managed to fully ignite just now. I hope you’re ready for what’s coming to you. Now. Please give me your phone. Or have you forgotten we’re on a case?” he snarks, coming back to himself with every passing moment of tactile distance.

John grins, shoving his phone across the table. Things are going _splendidly_.


	33. Chapter 33

Just as John finishes his coffee, Sherlock puts down John’s phone with a satisfied sigh.

“Now, we need only wait,” he says smugly.

“Wait for what? How long?” John asks, feeling a bit deflated. Half of the scenarios running through his mind while Sherlock worked had involved him transporting Sherlock back to Baker Street as quickly as possible and trying out that imagination of his.

Sherlock smirks, effortlessly following that train of thought.  “Wait for our fence to rise to my bait,” Sherlock says.

“What bait?”

“I updated your blog with a picture of this,” Sherlock says holding the blue sphere in his fingers. “Put the word out about this little bauble, giving some background and asking if anyone knows what it is.”

“What is it? Wait, you updated _my_ blog?”

“Yes, John. Shamming your writing voice is not that difficult, of course. But I’m fairly sure the man who hired our thief is--”

“Wait, hired? Sherlock, care to, you know, fill me in on whatever the fuck you found on that woman?”

Sherlock stares at John blankly for a moment and is astounded to realize that he had not yet informed him of his deductions concerning the dead thief. He’d been too distracted by John’s arm wrapped around his waist as they walked to the cafe across from Bart’s and had not actually told him anything. It was too late to go through all that now… Showboating during the moment of discovery was one thing, but this…

“Obvious. Clothing, shoes, rope burns, injuries... She’d been scaling a wall and just as she secured this in her hair she lost her grip, probably due to that mangled hand, and fell to her death. Sometimes, they’re not clever. Sometimes they’re just clumsy.”

“Yeah, ok, so that’s how she died, but how do you know she was for hire?”

“For hire may be too simple an explanation. I suspect it’s something closer to servitude. She hadn’t had her hand looked after. Anyone who had a choice in the matter would have. So, she doesn’t have access to the profits of her thefts.”

“So…”

“The jewels from our case have not appeared on the market as of yet. It is therefore reasonable to assume that the fence still has them in his or her possession. Lure the fence, seize the jewels, collect the commission.”

“And neutralize the fence.” John says, frowning.

“If convenient.”

“Sherlock….”

“Yes, yes, we’ll alert the Yard, but not until we have the jewels in our possession. Otherwise they’ll foul it up somehow, and we won’t receive our commission.”

John feels his eyebrows receding into his hairline. “Since when were you ever worried about the commission?”

“Since we have to cover extra expenses, _obviously_. It’s ten percent of the value of the jewels which are worth a great deal. The commission alone should not only cover Mary’s likely exorbitant shopping spree but also all the necessary impedimenta that invariably accompanies the arrival of a newborn, though I insist on having my own cot shipped down from the estate. This modern trash is incomparably ugly and I won’t have it--”

“Jesus, Sherlock,” John cuts him off, because he’s sure that if he allows Sherlock to keep saying these… things… his heart will literally burst out of his chest and make a mess all over their table.

“...Not good?” Sherlock asks mystified, wondering which ridiculous boundary he’s crossed now.

“God, no. Brilliant, just… you really...Jesus,” John manages.

Sherlock stares at him in consternation, reaching for his wrist to measure the beat of his pulse because he doesn’t understand John’s reaction and any additional data would be helpful.

“I fail to see why my willingness to contribute to our communal funds should be so surprising, or why my readiness to help support your child should be so shocking.  Up until now, your income interspersed with random bonuses of mine has been more than sufficient to uphold our preferred standard of living,  but your child will have needs which supersede your current and, let’s be honest, prospective salary and Mary’s combined.”

“ _Our_ child,” John says reflexively.

It’s a knife so sharp Sherlock barely feels puncture his heart.

“Obviously, biologically, it’s not mine,” he sneers, scornful.

“Shut up, you _stupid_ sod. I mean you, me. Mary. Us. _Your_. _Our child_. And tell me now, since you’re a bloody genius, tell me now, how I can love you more than I do at this moment?”

“...I hope to have a lifetime during which to urge you to new heights.”

John presses his eyes shut, momentarily unable to deal with this earnest, open, hopeful version of his friend.

“Back to Baker Street. _Now_ ,” he growls and is enormously gratified to feel Sherlock’s hand clench around his wrist where they had been gently clasped.

“Agreed.”

They’re half way to the door when John’s phone chimes an alert. He freezes half way through the door and looks quickly up at Sherlock, whose face is suddenly an impenetrable mask.

“Whatever you want,” Sherlock says shortly, his eyes intent on John’s. John shakes his head sharply, trying to clear it. The situation feels loaded to him...there’s more at stake than the simple choice between running off home or running off after a criminal. _Begin as you mean to continue, Watson_ …

“Fine,” he grinds out, slamming his hand against the wall of the coffee shop in frustration.  “Jewels first. I have a bloody date tomorrow night that I don’t wanna miss. But afterwards...afterwards we’re going home and continuing our...conversation,” he finishes, reaching out and gripping Sherlock’s arm. Sherlock grins down at him delightedly. Next thing John knows he’s been the victim of what he can only describe as a drive-by-bussing as Sherlock swooped past him, barely brushing John’s lips with his before spinning away to hail a cab.

 

 


	34. Chapter 34

The cab ride turned out to be mercifully short. The comment seemed innocuous enough:

“I think I recognize what you have there. I’d love the chance to help you out in person. I’m working late tonight if it’s urgent. Big fan.” And he’d left an address near the center of the residential warren that is Brixton.

“Don’t see anything resembling offices here…” John mutters, staring at the maps app on his phone.

“Of course not. However, there is an internet cafe on Loughborough within a block of that address, and I am willing to bet he sent his comment from there. There will be CCTV footage from across the street of him entering and exiting. Enough for the Yard to be getting on with, should they not be able to catch him red handed.”

“Why not call Lestrade now? I still don’t see how we’re going to get him to give up the location of his cache.”

“If it’s who I expect, then--”

“Expect? You know who we’re looking for?”

“For God’s sake, John, how many people do you think there are who can not only control a thief of that caliber but also have a hope of turning a profit from such high profile jewels? He’s a man with buyers and collectors already lined up, not your garden-variety thug. This is a professional. And there are only three operators who could manage that in London. I know each and every one. It’s just a matter of figuring out which one it is, and hopefully he or an intermediary will meet us. By the way, do you have your gun on you?”

The weight of it is suddenly very comforting.

“Why would I bring my gun with me?” John snarks, rolling his eyes. Sherlock glances at him sidelong and smiles, resting his hand on John’s thigh.

“Brilliant,” is all he says.

They pull up at a corner a block away from the address given and walk slowly down the narrow, darkened street. Sherlock tries to analyze their surroundings but John keeps brushing up against him with shoulder or hand, and it’s impossible, simply impossible to focus on anything except that ephemeral touch.

He watches John from the corner of his eye, taking in his loose stance, his easy gait. He’s unaffected. It’s _maddening_. It’s like blindness, or deafness, this terrible focus. They pass an alcove between buildings, and Sherlock sidesteps swiftly, pulling John after him and spinning quickly, crowding him against the brick, bracketing him with his arms.

“Do you know what you’re doing to me?” he growls, quietly, teeth clenched next to John’s ear. After a moment, John relaxes slightly, and Sherlock feels a warm hand slip under his coat and rest on his waist.

“I have some idea, yes,” John murmurs against his cheek, sounding insufferably smug.

“You have to stop. I can’t _think_!” Sherlock snarls slamming his chest against John’s, pinning his head back against the wall. The gentle hand at his waist becomes a fist, bunching fabric and skin and John’s other hand snakes into the curls at the nape of his neck and pulls, wrenching Sherlock’s head back and exposing his throat and giving himself a few millimeters of space.

John stares hungrily at the pale expanse of skin and licks his lips but now is not  the time and unlike this adolescent man-boy pressed deliciously against him, he has _some_ fucking self control, he does.

“It’s not like there’s an off switch, Sherlock,” he mutters, relaxing his hand on Sherlock’s waist and slowly relinquishing the pressure on his hair. Sherlock shudders violently then sighs and leans, allowing his forehead to rest on the brick above John’s head.

“You’re so distracting,” he murmurs. “Will it always be this way now? It’s _intolerable_. I’m useless. All I can sense is you.”

John sighs, wanting more than anything to reach his fingers back into the soft tangle of curls and kiss the man breathless. But that won’t help matters, and Sherlock sounds honestly distraught, and that is emphatically _not_ the reaction John was going for. Instead, he gently pushes Sherlock back, tilting his head up to catch Sherlock’s eye.

“This is all new. It... doesn’t come with a manual, and somehow I doubt you’d read one if it did. But for now, and while we’re on cases, I won’t-- no more teasing. I didn’t realize how...effective I was. That’ll help.”

Sherlock narrows his eyes at ‘teasing,’ but says nothing, deciding that a curt nod is all the answer John requires. He straightens, smoothes his shirt, and adjusts himself, shooting the cuffs of his coat before cocking an eyebrow at John and striding out of the alcove. John huffs out a breath and follows.

A man is standing in front of a grill-covered storefront in a circle of street light. He looks up sharply as Sherlock and John approach, and John speeds up fractionally so that he’s walking abreast of Sherlock, though not near enough to touch him. Sherlock seems oblivious, focusing on the man in the light, and John relaxes fractionally.

“I’m looking for a friend of mine, an antiques dealer,” Sherlock says stopping in front of the man. He’s nearly as tall as Sherlock and fidgets nervously, glancing between Sherlock and John.

“Yeah. He said you’d be coming. Mr. Holmes is it? Didn’t say nothin’ ‘bout no friend though,” the man says, narrowing his eyes at John.

“And our mutual friend thought I’d allow you to whisk me away who knows where without my faithful blogger?” Sherlock asks, grinning. “Not likely.”

The man scowls and shakes his head, shifting from foot to foot.

“Come on then, but behave. Our friend’s gone a bit twitchy lately,” Sherlock nods and moves to follow as the man walks quickly down the alleyway. John sees him glance about him quickly before focusing on a CCTV camera for a moment. He blinks rapidly and then looks away, winking at John, who rolls his eyes and quickens his pace so as not to lose their escort in the shadows.

They move into the labyrinth of public housing low-rises and enter one through a hallway that smells sourly of cabbage and other even less palatable odors. The stairwell up which they climb flickers in the dying sulphur lamp attached to the bare, graffiti covered cinder block wall.  They finally stop by a door that, to John, looks like every other door they’ve passed, but apparently speaks to Sherlock.

“Ivan,” he mutters earning him a scowl from their guide.

“How’d you know that?” he says, turning and blocking the door, arms folded across his chest. “I didn’t never tell you that.”

“You ‘didn’t never’ have to, you idiot. You know who I am. Let me in before I lose patience or Ivan does.”

John shifts carefully, recognizing increased hostility and not a little fear in the man’s face. Sherlock glares, and the man finally gives, rapping on the door before opening it.

The flat is dimly lit and cluttered and reeks of incense and stale cigarette butts. John fights down the urge to cough. There are four other men in the flat besides them, one in what passes for a kitchen and three sitting in various positions on a ratty wrap-around sofa in the living room beyond.

Sherlock strides straight into the center of that room without a care in the world and regards one of the men on the sofa.

“Your last place was...not quite as disgusting. Business going down hill?” Sherlock snarks. John stands at the entrance to the room in parade rest which puts his hands nicely near his sig. Something does not feel quite right.

“No, business is as good as ever,” the man says. John stares. The posh upper east end accent is totally at odds with the man’s appearance. “The cost of doing business has, however, increased of late.”

“That explains your new choice in clientele,” Sherlock sneers.

“Indeed it does. Considering it is your fault that I’m in such dire straits at the moment, I’ll accept the bauble you’ve brought with you as an apology,” the man bites out.

John is not concerned with the fact that he’s woefully under informed. It doesn’t bother him that Sherlock failed to mention his previous dealings with this criminal. These situations are par for the course, and the reason why John and Sherlock work so well together is that John genuinely _doesn’t care_ about the minutia.

What he _does_ care about is that the bloke in the kitchen behind him has stopped moving altogether. John can hear the active silence fall like a curtain.  The two sitting on the couch to the left of Ivan have made the shift from passive to active stillness as well. John recognizes the transformation, though it isn’t a physical one.

He knows for damn sure that if he can see it Sherlock can too and the only thing stopping John from going off like a claymore mine is the set of Sherlock’s shoulders, still relaxed. Well, that and the fact that, though these men are not criminal masterminds on the same level as Moriarty, they don’t have to be to put bullets into both of them. John wishes Sherlock hadn’t gone quite so far into the center of the room, but the man had never displayed any sense for tactics.  

“I propose a trade,” Sherlock says, pulling the blue marble out of his coat pocket. “A client wants her brooch back. And her necklace. You know what I’m talking about.”

“That’s hardly a fair trade. Besides, which, why trade when I can just take what I want and leave? We can clear everything meaningful out of this flat in twenty minutes and even you, Sherlock Holmes, will not be able to find where we next set up shop.”

“It’s fortunate for me, then, that my pet DI will be showing up with the cavalry in fewer than ten minutes.”

“Nonsense, Holmes. You haven’t had time to contact them. We’ve been watching you since you since you met up with my man on the street, as it were.” Just then John hears a phone vibrate. One of the to the right of Sherlock picks up and scowls at the message her reads before handing it over to Ivan. Ivan glances at it and sighs, rolling his eyes heavenward.

“Not much time now. Those jewels are only worth money. I can’t begin to imagine what kind of unpleasantness will ensue if your new client doesn’t get what you promised _him_ ,” Sherlock growls.

The hairs on the back of John’s neck stand on end. They’re walking the knife’s edge here, and everyone, even Sherlock, seems to know it.  

“Fuck,” Ivan says, almost casually. “Pack up boys. And you,” he says, gesturing to the grunt on his left. “Pay the man.” The grunt scowls but walks quickly into the other room. Sherlock remains standing, perfectly still, staring at Ivan. John hears a quiet whisper of movement from the kitchen and wonders if they’ll be able to get out without killing anyone after all.

He doesn’t dare take his eyes off Sherlock as the grunt comes back in holding a bag. Sherlock holds out his other hand and the man tips the bag into it. John sees the flash of gemstones pool in Sherlock’s palm. Sherlock doesn’t even look down, just stares at Ivan as he pockets the jewelry. He holds the bauble between his finger and thumb and begins backing towards John. Ivan narrows his eyes.

“You can have it,” Sherlock says, “when we’re through the door. I’m not stupid, Ivan. Tell your man in the kitchen to allow us to pass or, I don’t know, I’ll swallow this thing and you’ll have a hell of a time cutting it out of my corpse before the police arrive.” Sherlock waves the orb around and his lips twitch slightly as he observes how everyone’s eyes follow it.

John’s ready for the man in the kitchen when he moves, knife in hand, to even the playing field. His sig is in his up, leveled at the man’s eyes before he even shifts his stance.

“Don’t think so, mate,” John says with a small, tense smile. “He’ll drop the thing as soon as we’re out the door. Best just let us through.” The man glares and tenses. “Or, I mean, I could blow your head off, if you’d prefer.” John says, gratified to hear Sherlock’s quiet snicker.

Sherlock backs behind John as they near the door, pushing it open behind him with one hand, holding the orb in his fingers. John covers the room, eyes sweeping, gun steady, watching the men watch the little pebble in Sherlock’s fingers.  He wonders briefly what the hell it is and then it’s sailing through the air and they are running like hell down the hallway. They’re in the ground level landing of the stairwell outside when they hear distant sirens.

“Oi! You two!” Lestrade hisses from the shadow of the building.

“Oh good, you’re already here. Hurry up or you’ll miss them. #342. Go!” Sherlock hisses, and Lestrade and his men run up the stairs leaving them on the landing. John can’t stop the laughter from bubbling up but tries hard to stifle it till they’ve jogged a bit further away from the building.

“Jesus, Sherlock, I thought we had it there for a moment, when that big bloke came out of the kitchen.” John laughs as they slow to a walk. Sherlock smirks and reaches for John, clasping a hand lightly around the back of his neck, pulling him close before sliding his arm around his shoulders. John smiles and slides his arm under Sherlock’s open coat and around his waist, tucking himself closer and resting his hand just over Sherlock’s hip.

“You had him covered, John. We were in no real danger. Did you notice the look on his face when I threw it?”John can feel Sherlock’s chuckle between them where their sides are pressed together and decides there is little else on earth that would feel as right as that vibration.

“Nope, was running before it left your fingertips. Bet it was priceless. What was it anyway?”

“Gum ball.”

John stops abruptly, staring up at Sherlock.

“ _Gum ball_?”

“On balance, it’s probably best Lestrade apprehended Ivan before he figured that out…” Sherlock says wryly, slipping his hand into his pocket and pulling out the sphere and holding it out to John for inspection. John takes it and Sherlock moves them forward again, shoving John ahead of him slightly before tucking him back under his arm.

John does his best to examine it under the streetlights. Some kind of semi precious stone. There is what appears to be a hole in one side..hardly a centimeter across. There seems to be carving along the walls of the hole, but it’s far too dark to make out anything. His close proximity to Sherlock begins to take its toll on John’s ability to concentrate on the stone in his hand. He suppresses a delighted shiver as Sherlock begins stroking his arm, from shoulder to elbow and back again and abandons all hope of deduction.

“I give up,” John says, passing the round stone back to Sherlock. “Can’t make heads or tails of it.”

“Three churches in the world have such stones imbedded in their walls,” Sherlock says, pocketing it and smiling slightly. “What appears to be a hole is actually a carving, incredibly detailed. They almost look laser-etched under magnification.” Each carving depicts a symbol of religious significance.”

John’s breath catches as Sherlock breaks the shoulder to elbow pattern and brushes his fingers up the side of his neck, his fingertips playing gently over the ridge of John’s jaw before stroking down his throat to his shoulder.

“Most of these stones have been lost to history or collectors,” Sherlock continues. “The chapel in which the thief was found is notable for only one reason-- the presence of an almost complete set.” Here Sherlock pauses and John tightens his arm around Sherlock’s waist, tucking his fingertips into the slit of Sherlock’s trouser pocket, relishing the warmth and the firmness of the thigh beneath thin, smooth wool.  “There is only one collector of the stones that would be willing to pay any price for this one to complete his collection.”

“Who is that?”  John asks, drawing small circles against Sherlock’s hip with the pad of his thumb. Sherlock shivers delicately, his fingers tightening convulsively on John’s bicep and John wonders whether they’re going to make it to a cab or be forced to annex the alcove they took advantage of earlier.

“A Russian mafia kingpin. Very dangerous man. Probably contacted Ivan after he heard about..well.”

John purses his lips. By unspoken agreement he’d avoided asking Sherlock specifics about his time away, but clearly this case brushed against the edges of Moriarty’s network. Instead of asking he slides his hand from Sherlock’s hip to his waist, tugging the detective still closer to his side, eager to erase the time away with more contact.

“Forget the alcove, John,” Sherlock rumbles, his voice low and husky. “I have several strong motivations urging me to catch a cab as soon as possible and get home, the very least of which is the three quarters of a million pounds worth of jewelry being crushed between our hips.”

“What could possibly take precedence over _that_?” John asks, breathless, smiling up at Sherlock’s stern profile. Sherlock’s eyes glitter like the diamonds in his pocket when stops moving and he lowers his gaze to John’s.

“Denuding you,” he whispers, smiling conspiratorially, and John shudders as his warm breath puffs across his ear. “Subjecting every single inch of your body to my scrutiny,” Sherlock rumbles, drawing John firmly against his chest and wrapping long arms tightly around his shoulders.

John cranes his neck back, unable and totally unwilling break eye contact. He circles his arms around Sherlock, splaying his fingers wide over the small of his back, a gesture both deliciously intimate and possessive.

“Mentally mapping every mole, freckle, line and scar for future reference.” Sherlock continues, deepening his voice and finding the result- a tensing of John’s muscles and clenching of his fingers enormously gratifying.

“Finding out whether the skin at the junction of your clavicles tastes like sea salt, which I rather think it must after our exertions today. And that’s just the beginning of the list of things that I have longed to do,  that are more important to me by far than a pile of diamonds that pales in comparison to your brilliance,” Sherlock finishes, his expression suddenly fierce, reflecting the depth of an abrupt, unexpected wave of emotions for which he has, as yet, no name.

“Fucking Christ.” John hisses and Sherlock finds himself hurled bodily against the wall of the adjacent building. The chill of the brick is thrown into sharp relief by the warmth of John’s body as he crowds against him, making a stunningly successful effort to invade and occupy as much of Sherlock’s space as possible with his own. The last holdout is Sherlock’s mouth which he gleefully surrenders to the violent onslaught of John’s lips, teeth and tongue. Sherlock opens to him with a quiet, needy moan that he barely recognizes, having never made a similar sound before.

John’s answering growl is immediate and feral, and it unlocks a series of doors in Sherlock’s mind allowing him to suddenly understand all manner of things about himself and his long-dormant desires that he would never have guessed at but seem so _right_ and so _possible_ and so _goddamned close_ now.

John’s wedged a knee between Sherlock’s thighs and he finds himself tilting his hips forward, suddenly desperate for friction against his growing erection. John’s tongue sweeps into his mouth with broad, ravenous strokes and his fingers have found their way under both blazer and shirt and are greedily exploring the expanse of Sherlock’s stomach, lats and back.

John finds himself wondering with the small part of his brain still capable of rational thought if Sherlock is glowing-- The temperature of  the smooth, soft skin beneath his palms seems elevated to the point where infrared may actually be visible in the darkness if he stares hard enough. He gives the thought up. Reconnaissance would mean retreating from Sherlock’s soft, hot, seductively pliant mouth and John Watson has _never_ retreated from such a battle ground, no need to start now, thank you very much.

Any remaining concern John feels about the incongruity, the sheer ridiculousness of what they’re doing right here out in the open melts away as Sherlock arches his back, tilting his hips forward to rub against John’s thigh in small, frustrated movements. The resulting friction elicits a series of soft moans felt more as subtle vibrations against John’s lips rather than actually heard.

The sensation of those slim hips bucking desperately against him and knowledge that  he’s somehow succeeded in bringing Sherlock to the point of quivering, needy incoherence just from kissing him has a profound physiological effect on John.

His situational awareness does not so much evaporate as telescope,  focusing like a laser on the man pressed against him as everything, the pavement, the street lights, the cool night breeze, fades like mist into peripheral insignificance and he knows he’s losing control and _doesn’t fucking care_ and he also doesn’t notice the sound of approaching footsteps.

He does notice when the object pinned in the line of his focus stills and stiffens, disengaging.

“Oi! What the fuck do we have here? Coupla fucking poofs having a go right out in the open! Fucking disgusting.”

_Three, medium weight unarmed, high, potentially unpredictable but no real threat_... “John NO!” Sherlock shouts, jumping from deduction to panicked action almost  instantly, grabbing John’s arm as spins towards the men, already reaching for the sig nestled at the small of his back.

John makes the jump from overwhelming lust to pure, incandescent unrestrained _rage_ in one terrifying  moment, and only Sherlock’s restraining hold has saved these worthless fucks in front of him.

“ _What did you say_?” John snarls and Sherlock, who prides himself on his complete index of John’s angry voices adds a new entry with the note “completely fucking batshit insane” appended to it and experiences a brief moment of intense regret that he can’t see the expression on John’s face which would also, undoubtedly be new and likely terrifying judging by the idiots’ reaction.

The men freeze momentarily, rabbits in headlights, and Sherlock rushes into the breech, frighteningly plausible visions of John carted away for murder crowding against the dregs of ecstasy now fading from his awareness.

He summons up every iota of psychotic menace that he has ever cultivated as he rises from the brick wall, looming behind John, and throws it all into one expression, one word.

“ _Run._ ”

Sherlock releases his bruising grip on John’s arm as the footsteps fade into the distance and spins him around, grasping his chin in long, shaking fingers and crushing their lips back together, suddenly desperate to rekindle the fires they’ve built, anxious that John will overthink the whole thing and it’ll all fall apart. He smiles as John responds wholeheartedly. He sighs in relief.  Apparently a little violence sprinkled into the mix is not going to impede matters at all. He cups the back of John’s neck and tries to deepen the kiss, growling in frustration as John pulls away.

“Sorry, Sherlock, but if we get interrupted again, I _will_ kill someone and we won't get to finish this for a long time. Cab. Home. God, _now_.”

Sherlock barks out a laugh as John practically runs down the sidewalk towards Loughborough vowing to chuck himself onto the first cab that appears. Fortunately for his ribs this proves unnecessary.

Five minutes into their trip home, the cabby snaps.

“I’m warning you, I’ll charge you for cleaning if you two bastards makes a mess of my cab.”

“Better drive faster before that becomes an issue then, hadn’t you?” John snarks to Sherlock’s delight, lifting his mouth just long enough to bite off the sentence before descending again.

On balance, Sherlock thinks, just as his ability to do so is severely compromised by what John’s hand is doing between his legs, this promises to be the most memorable cab ride of his life.

 

 


	35. Chapter 35

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is sexy sex here. Beware :D

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally. Sorry for the wait. Ironically, this sexy little (long) chapter was the hardest one for me to write so far. I am fucking THRILLED to shove it out into the world and move on to other sexy chapters. Craving feedback. Thanks to [Blue Morpho](http://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueMorpho/)and [Amilyn](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Amilyn/) for all their help.

John stumbles after he is basically launched from the cab ahead of Sherlock who is busy shoving money and shouting abuse at the cranky driver.

“You have the worst luck with cabbies,” he snarks, laughing as Sherlock slams the door and turns to John in a haughty swirl of coat and collar, snagging him and pulling him into a somewhat awkward embrace, and they stagger towards the door of their flat.

“At least you didn’t shoot this one,” Sherlock mutters, his lips moving against the side of John’s neck as he turns in Sherlock’s arms to open the door.

“Close thing though.” John says, missing the lock as Sherlock nibbles a bit of skin just above the collar.

“Come on, John,” he rumbles. “While we’re young.” John snorts at that and finally manages to turn the key in the lock and the door flies open in front of him as Sherlock shoves him forward into the entryway, reaching out to steady him and kicking the door shut behind them. John turns and grabs the lapels of his coat and pulls Sherlock further in and against him, nipping at his lips.

In the cab, they’d wrestled, insofar as wrestling in the back of a London cab with a damned annoying cabbie in the front seat is possible. With subtle movements they’d playfully warred for dominance -- Sherlock’s hands pinning John’s wrists to his sides as they kissed, John’s hand gripping the back of his neck as they kissed, Sherlock pinning him against the door as they kissed.

John had extrapolated from this skirmish the likely action for the rest of the evening: play-fighting through the flat, divesting each other of their clothing until one or the other or both gave up and they fell into Sherlock’s bed, a tumble of naked limbs and went at it, all laughter and coiled muscle and lust. The idea is still fresh in his mind, and he pulls Sherlock eagerly towards the stairs.

The back of his calf hits the stair, and John stumbles backwards and up, pulling Sherlock with him as he tries to catch his balance, and they both end up falling awkwardly--John hard on his ass and Sherlock on his knees two stairs below him.

Not so bad, John decides as Sherlock presses against him, his lean torso slotted nicely between John’s thighs. Tilting his head up to kiss had been novel and unexpectedly erotic, but now it’s Sherlock below, tilting his dark head back, lips parted. The change in position and posture alters their dynamic abruptly.

John feels a rush of overwhelming protectiveness and almost unbearable tenderness at the sight of Sherlock on his knees, pale eyes peering from beneath his dark, curling fringe, his expression suddenly dazed and so open, so _vulnerable_.  It’s so much more right for this moment, for the culmination of what amounts to years of deferred affection, that John shelves his previous plans and reaches for Sherlock.

He gently feathers his fingertips along the lines of Sherlock’s jaw and strokes lightly up into his hair, inhaling sharply as he feels the man tremble beneath his hand. He tugs lightly at the silken curls, tilting Sherlock’s head back and catching his eyes, trying through gaze and touch to translate the complexity of his emotions, the intensity of his intent into a language that Sherlock can understand, knowing that words might be wrongly interpreted, potentially disregarded and needing Sherlock to understand him.

And because it’s _Sherlock_ , who sees John, who has been in the habit of analyzing his friend in the minutest of ways for years, because it’s Sherlock, telepathy seems to work.

Sherlock’s eyes widen and his mouth forms that perfect ‘O’ of discovery before he moans- a soft, whispered sound, and shudders, sliding shaking hands up John’s back. John bends over him, pressing their bodies together and cradling Sherlock’s head against him, rocking them gently.

“John,” Sherlock breathes, his fine, deep voice reduced to a husky whisper. “John, I’ve never--” He pulls back slightly to catch John’s eyes, the unfamiliar fluttering in his chest and stomach causing him to shiver delicately, though he feels deliciously warm.

John strokes a calloused thumb over Sherlock’s cheek and smiles, and John’s smile, his warmth, his encircling arms and gentle hands, his scent and breath and his presence are everything that Sherlock wants and needs and he shuts his eyes, deciding abruptly that he’ll live here, face pressed into the hollow of John’s shoulder, until he dies or his knees give out, whichever comes first.

“I haven’t either, you know. With a man,” John whispers into his curls. “But you’re a genius, and I’m a doctor, and I’m sure we can work out the mechanics.”

Sherlock huffs out a small laugh and nuzzles his face back into John’s neck, lazily working his lips and tongue around the flesh above his pulse point.

John moans and rocks, and strokes Sherlock’s hair and hums. “I want to take you apart, you know,” he murmurs, not sure where the words are coming from but happy that he has finally found them. He’s usually rubbish at this. “I want to lavish on your body all the love and pleasure that you deserve, you beautiful creature, you impossible man.”

Sherlock’s lips still against his neck and John cards his fingers through the tussle of curls, then slides his hand down to cup the back of Sherlock’s neck which he unconsciously kneads in time with the cadence of his words.  “I want to show you how precious you are, I want to strip you out of your clothes, and strip you out of your armor and finally see your heart, Sherlock. I want every part of you.”

Sherlock tightens his arms around John’s shoulders and shudders again, kissing a soft line from John’s shoulder to his jaw, rolling the impossible words around in his mind before creating a garden there and planting them, eager to discover what fruit they’ll bear in the future. He loosens his arms around John’s shoulders and leans back and smiles, shocked when John reaches forward and brushes tears from his cheeks.

“If you wanted to see my heart, John, you had only to look in a mirror,” he says and John’s lips when they meet his are salty and slightly bitter with taste of his own tears. Sherlock fights to master himself. Tears are an unwelcome reaction, incongruous with the warmth, the pleasure and joy that suffuses him completely...except for one intrusive point of discomfort. “John?” he asks breathlessly, breaking the kiss.  

“Yes, Sherlock?” John asks, his voice muffled against Sherlock’s neck, where he’s nuzzling and licking.

“Knees, John.”

“What? Oh! Come on then,” John says, standing quickly and reaching out a hand to help Sherlock up.

“Not that I _mind_ kneeling,” Sherlock says, smiling and taking John’s proffered hand to get to his feet. His knees pop loudly. “But maybe a pillow or something.” 

“Need that in writing. Sherlock Holmes, willingly taking a knee,” John says, closing the door of their flat firmly behind them, feeling a spike of raw excitement as he turns the lock behind him. No interrupting Mrs. Hudson. His heart rate ratchets up a bit. This is really happening.

Sherlock’s still smiling as he turns back to John, having divested himself of both coat and jacket in one fluid movement. But there’s something else there. There’s a tentativeness to Sherlock’s movements as he coils his limbs around John again, a hesitance as he noses forward for a kiss.

“You have questions,” John says between soft kisses. Sherlock smiles, realizing for the first time just how observant John is, when properly motivated, and just how intimately he knows him.

“A successful deduction,” Sherlock says, tugging at the hem of John’s shirt under his jumper, freeing it from his trousers. “When you-- That is to say when you and Mary…” His words trail off into a quiet moan as John brushes the palm of his hand over Sherlock’s groin before busying themselves with his belt buckle.

“When Mary and I have sex?” John finishes, for him, slowly drawing the belt through the loops and discarding it on the floor. “Sherlock, are you blushing _now_?” he asks, smiling. Sherlock snorts softly but John can feel his lips twist into a smile against his neck. Sherlock, aroused, smiles often. Sherlock smiles aroused. John decides then and there he’ll keep Sherlock permanently aroused from now on, just to see that miraculous smile.

“I may be blushing, but I’m about to ask you for something that might be considered ‘naughty,’ so I’m allowed.”

“Unsurprisingly, you’re gorgeous when you blush. By all means, continue.  And for the record, I can’t wait to hear what you consider naughty,” John says, relishing the way Sherlock’s brows knit and his mouth works as John slowly, carefully lowers the zip on his trousers.

“I, uh. When you and Mary. Mmmmm. It seems as though there is often a, _Jesus Christ_ , a mutual decision to _God_ don’tstop-don’tstop.”

Sherlock can almost see his train of thought derail as John presses one hand against the small of his back and tucks the other under the vee of his open fly and lightly palms his erection from top to bottom, a gently teasing, flat handed stroke which he repeats once more before hooking his thumbs into the waistband of Sherlock’s trousers, chuckling low as Sherlock bucks reflexively against his hip, then sags forward, resting his cheek on John’s head.

“Are you asking me to take charge, Sherlock? I’m just as new at this as you are, are you sure that’s wise?” John smirks, tugging at Sherlocks trousers before sliding his hands under the waistband and cupping his ass, pulling him closer. Sherlock has a momentary vivid memory of being pressed between a brick wall and the heavy heat of John’s body.  

“God, yes, I’m sure. And I am a wise man, John. You said so yourself. And this…it will be easier for me if you guide me in this. At least for now, if you-- if that’s--”

“Yes. _Yes_ , Sherlock,” John says quickly, eager to stave off whatever crisis of self-consciousness Sherlock seems about to indulge in. He pulls away and grasps his hand leading them through the kitchen and into the hallway amused at the novelty of leading Sherlock anywhere. He pauses by the door to the loo, makes a quick decision and ducks in, pulling Sherlock in behind him.

“Sherlock, take your shirt off,” he says, reaching for the taps. Sherlock stares at him for a moment and John wonders if he’s going to refuse. He cocks his head to the side, reaches forward and catches Sherlock’s wrist in his hand, squeezing ever so slightly, a tacit reminder that he _asked_ for this. The pressure, or the intent, or some combination of the two is like a switch. Sherlock’s lips part and his eyes flutter shut.

“Unbutton your shirt, Sherlock. And slide it off, followed by your pants.” John says, the request bordering on an order. He turns away, adjusting the taps to accommodate the scalding temperature that Sherlock prefers. By the time he turns around, Sherlock is standing behind him, naked, staring at the ground and biting his lower lip, nervously twitching the fabric of his shirt through his fingers by his side.

John is a doctor. He’s seen a lot of naked bodies, many of which have had holes blown through them but plenty of which had been whole, some of which had been attractive and one or two of which had caused him to defer treatment to another doctor because he found them so distractingly beautiful. He’s seen, loved and worshiped his wife’s body every day since the day after they met. The point is, John’s had experience with bodies. Therefore, his reaction to seeing Sherlock’s, naked, totally takes him by surprise.

It’s not the smooth, pale expanse of skin that arrests John’s breath, that causes his heart to begin its first serious attempt at breaking violently out of his rib cage. It’s not the subtle, beautifully defined musculature that ripples beneath that impossible, almost translucent covering with every breath.  It’s not the goddamn _artistic_ gradient of ivory to ebony shadow that deepens at the hollow of Sherlock’s groin or the profoundly masculine beauty of his erection rising above it that evokes a wave of desire that damn near _decimates_ John as it crashes down through his body, pooling hot and churning in the pit of his stomach.

Later, in the darkness of Sherlock’s room, coiled in his long limbs, John would analyze this moment and realize that the cause of his disconcertingly sudden, aching arousal had been the heart wrenching vulnerability of the man standing before him, stripped of the regalia that transforms him into the towering, intimidating paragon of arrogance he shows to the world, that shields and protects him as he navigates the minefields of his life.

He would realize that the first note of the final movement of the song of their lives together had sounded in the silence there and resonated between them, that this new facet of Sherlock’s personality, unearthed from beneath billowing black fabric and layers of hubris and pride fulfills John’s basic, cell-deep need to protect, to tend and nurture and support and to _possess_ , filling a void he hadn’t even known existed. But that would be later.

 _Right now_ , John does not question or analyze but _acts_ on those subconscious cues, reaching out to snatch away the shirt twisting in Sherlock’s hand drawing the man closer, running hands and lips firmly and quickly over his shoulders and chest, drinking in the soft sounds those touches elicit.

Sherlock allows his eyes to flutter shut as John’s warm hands and soft lips glide over his skin, every stroke gentling and calming and intensely arousing. He finds it is suddenly so easy, so deliciously, incredibly easy to let his mind drift, to abandon the cerebral for the tactile, to relinquish control and simply drift on the waves of pleasure flowing into him from John’s hands.

He fights the urge to kneel, to prostrate himself, to create some kind of physical manifestation of the intoxicating abandon he feels. But John stood  him here and here he will stand until he places him somewhere else. He relaxes under John’s touch, dropping his head back and basking in sensations that translate visually into prismatic bursts of light behind his eyelids.

He groans luxuriously as John gathers him closer, stepping into the arms coiling around his waist and pressing them together, skin flush against skin, and gasps as he feels the heat and hardness of John’s erection next to his, separated only by the thin fabric of John’s pants. Sherlock’s idly wondering how he’d failed to notice John removing his trousers in such close quarters when John dips his head and wraps his lips firmly over Sherlock’s nipple.

His eyes fly open as a sudden stab of ecstasy rips through him and he grasps John’s shoulder for support, crying out hoarsely as his knees threaten to give way. He can feel John’s satisfied growl reverberate through their bodies as he tightens his hold, crushing Sherlock to him and suckling, licking and nipping him, transforming him into a shaking, moaning, inarticulate being of mindless need and lust.

“John! _John_ , please, _please please please_ \--” Sherlock hears the words torn from his throat, but doesn’t know what he’s asking for, can’t process the raw sensations that crest over him with ever swirl of John’s tongue, every pinch of his teeth.

“Please what, Sherlock?” John takes a moment to say while transferring his attention to Sherlock’s other nipple. It takes Sherlock some time to pull words from the roiling miasma of blissed out confusion in his mind.

“Please _more! Please._..”  he moans deep and desperate, arching his back and throwing back his head, bearing as much of his body as he can, pinioned as he is in John’s grip, making as obvious an invitation as he can. “Please I want to _give_ you.. John, you have… you have to _take_...” he mumbles biting off his last words as John’s fingers claw down his back, still careful of his scars.

John groans, cupping Sherlock’s ass and slamming them together, rolling his hips forward into Sherlock and echoing his ragged moan at the sweet, hot pressure against his cock. Touching Sherlock is turning out to be an incredibly addicting habit. He’s responsiveness and yielding compliance are intoxicatingly empowering.

“Sherlock, step into the shower,” he says softly, pulling away with a kiss and a nip. Sherlock lets his hands drift over John’s arms as he puts space between them, a small gesture, eloquent in it’s simplicity. _Don’t leave, don’t stop._ But he obediently steps over the wall of the tub and into the hot spray and John watches the water cascade over his skin, raising a delicate flush over his shoulders and chest.

“You may be the most beautiful thing in existence,” John gives voice to his thoughts and Sherlock grins.

“Don’t let Mary hear you say that,” he says, his tone coy.

John chuckles, pulling off his pants and palming his cock, watching Sherlock watch him, captivated by his reaction.

“She’d agree, I’m sure,” he murmurs, stepping into the tub and pressing his palms against Sherlock’s chest, rubbing circles around water-slicked nipples. Sherlock leans back against the tiled wall and purrs. John grins to himself. It’s the only word that fits the rumbling, wordless sound reverberating through the room. He ghosts his fingers up John’s chest, lingering, as John knew he would, on the starburst scar in the hollow of his shoulder.

He watches Sherlock’s expression change, becoming keener, more observant and swears he can almost hear the gears shifting in that colossal brain and that just won’t do. John glances around, hoping for inspiration. He finds it in the shiningly new shower head. After Sherlock had managed to rip the old one out of the wall by hanging a… John’s mind skitters away from a memory best invoked to combat arousal rather than elicit it. Bottom line. New shower head you could hang a ham from. Or a Sherlock.

“Sherlock, I want you to turn and face the wall and grab the shower head with your hands.” he says, and Sherlock freezes, his expression clouding with uncertainty.  

John loops a hand around his neck and pulls Sherlock down into a soft, searching kiss that has him moaning against his lips in seconds, pliant and once more willing to be turned around by a hand on his waist. He stretches his arms above his head to grasp the shower head, careful not to obstruct the water flowing over them both and looks over his shoulder at John.

John smiles to himself and strokes his hands down the long, flushed column of Sherlock’s back briefly, ghosting his fingers over the scars over his shoulders-- which are healing quite nicely, actually-- and down to his hips before he circling his hand around Sherlock’s waist and sliding his fingers around his cock stroking lightly.  

Sherlock gasps and groans, arching his back and pressing his ass back against John, rubbing hard over his aching erection. As the outside edges of his vision flash white,  John realizes abruptly that his intention to extend their initial coupling over the following several hours is going to be completely impossible. As Sherlock groans again, letting loose a string of garbled expletives ending in a steady chant of John’s name, he revises his timeframe down to the next several minutes. Maybe. If they’re lucky.

A soft groan escapes Sherlock’s lips as John withdraws his hand and his knuckles whiten with the effort of hanging on despite an overwhelming urge to take himself in hand. He can hear John soaping up his hands and the thought of those slick digits gliding over his skin, cleansing and soft, is almost as good as the actual reality.

John hums deep in his throat as he washes down Sherlock’s chest and back, using his hands to gently massage the soap into his skin. He feels Sherlock relax under his ministrations, and grins to himself, impressed again with how incredibly easy it is to manipulate his body.

He soaps his palms again and his grin widens in anticipation before he slides his one slick hand over Sherlock’s shaft while sliding the other between his legs from behind, laving anus, perineum and bollocks in counterpoint strokes.

Sherlock keens, bucking forward  into John’s fist, releasing the shower head and clawing for purchase at the tile, struggling to keep his balance as his whole world tips, spiraling inwards to two points of contact on his body.

“John! God, John, _fuck_ , just-- _please_...” he sobs and is spun roughly around and slammed back into the tile again, John swarming over him, pressing into and against him, pinning him, and it’s just as they were earlier on the street when Sherlock realized he wanted _this_ , just this. John rolls his hips forward and traps their cocks together between them and Sherlock shudders, wracked with pleasure.

“Jesus Sherlock…is this what you want?” John growls, his control slipping.

“Yes! Yes--this…” Sherlock moans and lets his head fall back.  John grins and leans forward licking up Sherlock’s throat before latching his lips around the soft skin at his shoulder and biting down hard, grinding his hips forward again and again.

Pain and pleasure burn gloriously together through Sherlock’s body as John ruts against him, and Sherlock knows they’re close, both of them, but it’s not quite enough. John is shaking against his shaking body, growling in frustration between kisses and bites.

Sherlock writhes against him, ravenous for release, desperately wanting to watch John’s face as he comes. He tilts his head to meet John’s hungry gaze and presses his lips to John’s as he reaches between them, closing long fingers into a fist around their cocks, pressing them together and stroking quick and sure.  

John’s fingers dig into his shoulder and hip as he shouts Sherlock’s name his expression frozen in an agony of pleasure and Sherlock feels him pulsing in his hand and memorizes the look in his eyes, blown wide in that moment, blindingly, sublimely beautiful and Sherlock follows him down, spiraling through his own release, John’s name on his lips.

Sherlock sinks to his knees, sliding down John’s body, unable to stand any longer and John cradles his head against his hip, breathing raggedly and they just rest, leaning against each other under the hot spray of water.

“Mmmm,” John manages finally. “S’gonna get cold.”

“Yup.”

“We should. We should get out.”

“Yup.”

“Your knees will hurt. Should get up.”

“Yup.”

“Anderson’s a genius who deserves a promotion.”

“Fuck off, John.”

“Just checking. Come on. Ten steps to your bed. I invaded Afghanistan. We can do this.”

“Carry me, John. You’ve broken my brain and my legs.”

John chuckles and strokes through Sherlock’s hair, wondering if he should just let the oncoming freezing water do this job for him but decides against it. He reaches down and hauls a protesting Sherlock to his unsteady feet and fumbles with towels half-heartedly before giving it up for a loss and stumbling damply with Sherlock into Sherlock’s room and falling heavily onto the bed.

Sherlock turns badger, burrowing under the duvet and pulling John under after him before turning on him and engulfing him in a web of legs and arms. The end result is surprisingly comfortable and John sighs blissfully, carding his fingers through Sherlock’s damp curls as he begins to drift.

“John?” Sherlock’s voice is muffled by the pillow and John’s shoulder.

“Mmm?”

“I…good night, John.”

“Sherlock?”

“ _Sleep_.”

“I love you too.”

The cocoon of arms and legs contracts around John briefly and Sherlock sighs, long and deeply, oozing contentment from every pore.

Not bad, as first dates go, John thinks and sleeps the sleep of the blissfully happy.

 

 


	36. Chapter 36

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Moar porn!!! Mmmmm tasty. Enjoying writing this while working on angsty later chapters.

John wakes to the sound of water falling behind his head. _Shower_ , his groggy brain supplies, and he finds it strange he’s never heard the sound of the shower from Sherlock’s bedroom in all the years he’s lived at 221B. He burrows under the covers. Sherlock’s sheets are some bizarre fabric that is incredibly warm and unbelievably soft. He stretches again, arching until his back cracks and his knuckles rap against the headboard. There’s an answering knock from the other side of the wall.

“John! Join me.” Sherlock’s deep, imperious order is barely muffled by the intervening wall. John snorts and chuckles softly.

“First day of the rest of my life…” he mutters, stretching again and climbing from the bed. He briefly considers pulling on pants, but his are all in his room and he’ll likely be stripping them off again directly anyway. The thought makes his cock twitch, and a delicious ache gathers at his groin, making him want to arch and stretch again.  Instead he saunters out into the hallway.

Yesterday's pants and trousers and Sherlock’s shirt are outside the loo door and he takes a moment to fish his cell phone out of his pocket, relieved to see just enough juice for a text or two before it dies.

 _Shagged Sherlock last night. How’s shopping?_ He texts, grinning as he clicks send. He opens the door, phone in hand and blinks as steam billows out of the door into his face.

“No! Don’t turn the fan on, John. I’ll freeze,” Sherlock says just as he reaches towards the switch.

“You honestly expect me to believe you’ll freeze while being deluged by boiling water?” John asks, smiling, wiping uselessly at the mirror before giving it up for a lost cause and grabbing his toothbrush. “And how am I expected to shave when I can’t see the mirror for the fog?” he grouses good naturedly before cramming toothbrush and toothpaste into his mouth. The shower curtain is drawn aside just enough to permit Sherlock’s head to to poke his head out.

“Simple. _I’ll_ shave you,” he says, popping his head back in the shower. John rolls his eyes and grabs his phone as it chimes.

 _Brilliant! I don’t have to shoot you! Tell me everything when I get back._ John snorts and rinses and his phone chimes again.

_Hope you have milk, I may have maxed out our card. Good thing I have Sherlock’s. Molly says hi. xxxxxxx_

John groans.

“Moved onto my card has she?” Sherlock says, and John can practically hear the smirk.

“Sure has. Hope your client pays up soon.”

“Called them already. We’re to meet in just over two hours at their solicitor's offices. Will you get in here? I’ll take no responsibility if you run out of hot water before you even start.”  Sherlock huffs. John chuckles pulling aside the curtain, and no sooner does he step into the shower than he’s hauled into Sherlock’s arms, pulled tight against his lean body.

“Good morning,” John chuckles, wrapping his arms around Sherlock’s waist. Sherlock peers down at him smugly, smiling as he shifts his hips slightly so that his erection presses against John’s, causing them both to gasp lightly.

“Indeed it is. I woke up hard, thanks, I can only assume, to you, since it’s not something I’ve previously experienced.” Sherlock answers, arching an eyebrow and spinning them so that John’s under the scalding spray. John chuckles and reaches between them, stroking lightly down the length of Sherlock’s cock. Sherlock hums and slides his hands down John’s back to rest on the swell of his ass.

“So is this our thing?” John asks. “We’re gonna relegate our sexual encounters to the shower are we?”

“Seems the most efficient way of dealing with the inevitable mess,” Sherlock comments wryly, bending over John and dragging his lips down the side of his neck, licking at his skin. John shivers, stroking down Sherlock’s shaft again, thinking of all the things he’d like to do that would be incredibly awkward in the shower, but possible nonetheless...oh yes...so very, very _possible_.

Sherlock’s hums against him, vibrating so hard that John can see the water droplets shake apart on his chest which is utterly fascinating. John rolls his hips forward, sliding his hands everywhere, reveling in the softness of Sherlock’s skin.

“I can’t quite believe this,” he says softly as Sherlock draws his lips away, looking down at him.  

“Believe it, John.” Sherlock says simply, then sighs as John strokes his cock. “Believe nothing if not _this_ ,”  he murmurs, stroking his fingers through John’s hair and grasping his cock in his fist. They stand there, leaning against each other under the hot spray, stroking languidly and kissing.

Sherlock allows his head to fall fall forward, resting his cheek on the softness of John’s wet hair, relaxing into his touch and humming as wave after wave of sweet, heady pleasure sweeps through him.

Until last night, he’d regarded his body as more burden than boon, something that needed constant time and attention.  It habitually distracted him from more interesting things by needing sleep ( _horrid_ ) and food ( _boring_ ) and the occasional wank ( _tedious_ )-- all of which he provided as efficiently as possible-- while offering little in return other than his apparent attractiveness, and even THAT had to be cultivated carefully in order to be useful.

The missing ingredient had, apparently, been John Watson. And now that that ingredient had been added, his body is apparently trying to repay him for thirty-seven years of grudging care all at once.

Sherlock experiences several revelations in the next few moments, timed almost perfectly to John’s fantastic stroking.

1\. Passion, as a motivator for murder, now makes a startling amount of sense. He’d kill anyone who threatened _this_.

2\. Decidedly Not Good, and he doesn’t care.

3\. Sentiment is chemical, but only defective when it blinds. Sentiment as it pertains to John Watson is fucking _illuminating_.

“God, John, yes,” Sherlock hisses, brought solidly back to the present as John alters his strokes, sliding his palm over the Sherlock’s glans and thumbing the slit there gently in a subtle, circular massage.

He mirrors John’s movements, enormously gratified at the resulting tremor that rips through his compact body, memorizing the precise pitch and modulation of his eloquent moans. He realizes that the pleasure resulting from giving pleasure almost transcends the physical ecstasy coursing through him and there’s revelation #4.

“God, Sherlock,” John murmurs, rocking against him, nuzzling his cheek against his chest. “God, your hands...you feel-- you’re amazing. Incredible. I’m so close...so close.”  

Sherlock smacks suddenly into revelation #5- a nice round number for someone who hasn’t yet had tea- He’s abruptly completely certain that no service he has ever performed for science, for the victims of the crimes he solves, for the countless lives spared because of his intervention, for _any previous reason_ , can ever approach the importance of service that he’s performing right now- which is nothing short of bringing his small part of the universe back into balance.

Because, though he can not change history, can not actually take back the pain and the hurt and betrayal he’s caused, Sherlock can damn well do his best to redress the balance and supplant that agony with the surfeit of pleasure that John deserves.

Abruptly, he drops to his knees, feeling vaguely bereft as his cock slides out of John’s grip. He slides his hands up to Johns waist, stroking the curve of his hip bones with his thumbs.

“Sherlock what…” John’s words dissolve into rough moans as Sherlock reaches for his cock, grasping it at the root and laving John’s glans experimentally with his tongue. “ _Fuck_ Sherlock-- god your _mouth_ …” John gasps out, leaning against the wall for support, the cold tile tightening the skin on his back.

John tastes salty and slightly bitter, neither of which puts Sherlock off in the slightest as he licks, alternating the rigidity and pressure of his tongue with each swipe and cataloguing John’s responses.  He’s fantastically responsive, and Sherlock is pleased to reach the apex of his learning curve in under a minute.

As delightful as John’s soft exclamations are, Sherlock decides he’d rather hear him reduced to inarticulate expressions of uncontrollable ecstasy instead. Applying what he’s just learned with what he can extrapolate from what he would want done to his own body, he strokes John with  his fist a few times, pulling his mouth away to make eye contact before licking his parted lips and diving down onto John’s cock sliding the entire, not insubstantial length into his mouth and down his throat.

There is a long moment of stunned silence before John _roars_. Hands descend and fingers tangle and grip Sherlock’s hair and he feels his own cock harden and ache in sympathy as John bucks forward groaning. Sherlock would grin with delight if his mouth wasn’t so deliciously full of John’s thrusting cock. Incoherent raving achieved, he focuses on keeping his throat relaxed and suppressing his gag reflex as John fucks his mouth with abandon.

Somewhere in the back of John’s mind there’s a pinpoint of rational thought telling him that he’s slamming his dick down Sherlock’s throat and that it probably isn’t comfortable and he should be more careful. But his body is no longer his to control and Sherlock’s humming between thrusts which is hardly a sound of discomfort, and his hands are relaxed and stroking John’s hips and John’s skin feels like it’s on fire and how in _hell_ is he still standing? He can’t see, can’t think or breathe for the pure, pulsing hot pleasure suffusing every single atom of his body. It’s been good, it has been, this life, and he’s fine leaving it just like this which is what’s going to happen if he can’t find a way to breathe.

Air burns forcefully into his lungs as Sherlock surges forward, taking him deeper, pressing him to the wall with those ungodly long hands in the hollows of his hips, humming as he works John’s cock almost out of his mouth, swirling his tongue over the tip only to slam himself back onto it, again and again and again.

Every stroke shoots spikes of raw sensation ricocheting through John’s body before  gathering in a scorching, aching pool below his navel and honestly this isn’t even possible. John’s breath comes in gasps and moans as he struggles to process everything. It should be impossible to feel this much sensation. And suddenly it _becomes_ impossible.  

John’s orgasm is a sudden, searing violence for which he is utterly unprepared. His entire body, every muscle, every cell, clenches hard in a paroxysm of agonizing pleasure as he comes and comes down Sherlock’s throat, screaming his name.

Sherlock swallows convulsively, cataloguing flavors and textures as John spills into his mouth, and gentles his strokes, gliding his lips slowly and lightly over John’s pulsing, twitching cock until he’s spent and gasping.

Sherlock leans back on his heels and smiles smugly up at John before spreading his knees apart and taking his own erection into his hand, moaning as he strokes himself. He’s achingly hard and realizes abruptly that the simple act of fellating John had almost been enough to bring him to orgasm.

“Sherlock,” John murmurs, his voice thick, his eyes riveted on the glorious form of the man splayed out below him. Sherlock casts him a positively filthy look and reaches back, bracing himself with his unoccupied hand and arches up into the spray of the shower, knowing exactly how much the pose will affect John and experiencing a shock of excitement at how exposed it makes him feel.

He’s gratified but not surprised to hear the string of rather creative expletives that fall from John’s lips in hushed, awed tones as he flexes his hips, pumping fast into his fist.

“ _Sherlock_ ,” John repeats, his voice deep and hoarse.  Sherlock peers up at him through the water and is transfixed by the sight of him. Wreathed in curling steam, he stands still and strong,  his expression reflecting the extent of his dichotomous nature, both tender and intensely predatory.  Sherlock’s heart skips a few beats as John’s gaze burns into him, raking over his body like hands.

He moans, flexing his hips harder, increasing the frequency of his thrusting. John steps towards him, blocking the stream of water as he stands between Sherlock’s thighs, planting his feet slightly apart, pushing Sherlock’s knees wider and pinning them against the sides of the tub. Sherlock stares up at him, feeling his skin tighten in the cooler air, denied the heat of the water. The prickle of cool air does nothing but add to the churning, fluttering in his stomach that makes it very hard to breathe.

Goosebumps race over Sherlock’s chest and his nipples harden as John looks down at him intently. He takes in every nuance of Sherlock’s body as he fucks into his fist, watching in fascination as Sherlock’s movements become less graceful and more mechanical, astonished a bit awed as Sherlock’s inexorable mind slowly succumbs to the overwhelming sensations flooding through his body.

“John!” Sherlock shouts, his deep voice ragged and bleeding around the edges. “John…” he whispers the nails of the hand supporting him claw at the tile as his body tenses. “ _John_ …”

“No! Don’t shut your eyes,” John orders, bending over Sherlock’s body, running his hands over the twisting, taught muscles of his stomach. “Look at me, Sherlock, I want to see your eyes,” he pleads and Sherlock manages to slit them open to meet John’s focused, hungry gaze, struggling to keep them open as his body begins convulsing and he comes in long, protracted waves, crying out with each breath as his mind momentarily dissolves into thundering, cacophonous tranquility, John’s face swimming above him.

John moves out of the spray, and Sherlock sighs deeply as the hot water hits him, warming and stimulating his oversensitized flesh. John reaches towards him and Sherlock levers himself shakily to his feet and into his embrace, nuzzling his nose into John’s hair.  

“Is it natural to feel this ennervated after sexual encounters?” he asks, letting his eyes drift shut and leaning a heavily against John’s solid body. “It never happened to me when I took care of myself.”

“Sexual encounter? That’s what you call what just happened? I get a glimpse of the Great Beyond, and he calls it a ‘sexual encounter,’” John snorts incredulously, wrapping his arms around Sherlock’s waist and rubbing his cheek against his chest. Sherlock jolts slightly at the contact before pulling away, sliding his palm over John’s jaw.

“How many times must I tell you? I prefer my doctors clean shaven,” he gripes, smoothing his thumb over John’s cheek. John sighs and rolls his eyes, but can’t hide the smile tugging at the corners of his mouth and Sherlock’s eyes sparkle back at him.

“And I prefer my consulting detectives….” he breaks off frowning. “You know, Sherlock, I can’t think of a single thing about your body I’d improve. Not even as a joke,” he says, huffing out an annoyed laugh at Sherlock’s insufferably smug smile. Sherlock preens a bit before dipping in and kissing him lightly on the mouth.

“Well since I won’t have enough time to shave you properly before the water runs out, I suppose you’ll have to finish your ablutions on your own,” he snarks, but makes no move to leave the circle of John’s arms. Feeling the water temperature dip, John plants a lingering kiss on Sherlock’s shoulder and reluctantly releases him, turning away and reaching for the soap.


	37. Chapter 37

“Yeah, but how’d you know about him, Sherlock?”

I sigh, staring at the ceiling wondering again why Greg’s being such horse’s arse.  He isn’t usually. Sherlock’s about three seconds from snapping and I’ll never tell him, but I can’t blame him. I rub my fingers over my eyes wondering how a day that started off so brilliantly could go south so fast.

First the condescending arsehole solicitors earlier this morning-- honestly dealing with them was barely worth the insane amount of money we collected--  and now this undeserved  four-hour-long bitchfest that has completely killed any chance I had at a pre-dinner snog. I just want to go home and toss the pile of gorgeous righteous indignation that is Sherlock Holmes on the bed and have my way with him. Roughly.

“Why does it matter how I knew about him?  You apprehended one of London’s most notorious criminals, and I returned stolen property to their rightful owner. Case closed. I fail to understand why we’re still sitting here.” Sherlock grinds out.

“Of course _you_ don’t understand! This was a high profile arrest, Sherlock. Some of the stuff we recovered...it’s worth millions.  It’ll be all over tomorrow’s papers. I need some more background. There’ll be questions….You need to come clean.”

Sherlock surges to his feet, yanking on his coat and sneering down at Greg.

“Actually, _Graham_ , I don’t. Perhaps you’ve forgotten that I inform you of these situations out of courtesy. I was attending to a private matter for a client.  If you’re going to insist on treating me as though I’m one of your employees, I’ll begin charging you for my services. Let’s see if you detain me for six hours of pointless debriefing when you’re paying me a hundred pounds per hour!”

I don’t bother stifling a laugh and shrug at Greg’s glare. As far as I’m concerned, he’s asked for this. “If you’re quite finished interrogating me, we’re leaving. “

“Sherlock, I can’t keep covering for you. If it comes out that you’ve had previous illegal dealings with Ivan or anyone he’s working for I can’t protect you unless I know about them.”

“Greg, that almost sounds like a threat.”  I say, hardening my expression. “You’ve never had a problem before.”

Greg sighs, scrubbing his face with his hands.

“Not so much a threat as a warning, John. A heads up.  Ivan mentioned some things…” His eyes flit back and forth between Sherlock and me. “About what you did while you were... dead.”

Sherlock’s face clears abruptly, a small smile tugging at his lips. I feel unaccountably relieved.

“So that’s what this is about. Do not cut any deals with Ivan on my account, Lestrade.” he snaps. “He can _say_ whatever he likes. He can’t _prove_ anything.”

“How do you know, Sherlock?” I ask quietly, adrenaline spiking through me  as I remember the beating Sherlock took in the media before he-- before.

“I was thorough. And if I missed anything, which I didn’t, Mycroft assuredly has not,” he says, meeting my gaze straight on, confidence completely restored. “Don’t think another moment about it, John,” he finishes. I find myself fighting an incredible urge to reach out and grasp his fingers where it they twitch by his side.

“You’re not going to tell let me in on this, are you?” Greg asks, resigned.

“No, I don’t believe I will. Although, I do appreciate your concern,” Sherlock says, and he’s through the door in a swirl of coat leaving Greg gawking after him in shock.

“Did he just...say that?”

“Yeah. I suppose so. Chalk it up to excitement,” I say, chuckling and reaching for my jacket, feeling no small amount of that myself.

“Excitement? About what?”

“John!  Come on! We’’ll be late.”

I shrug and smile as I slide out the door, leaving Greg shaking his head.

Sherlock is intimidating a cab into pulling over for us as I meet him on the kerb.

“Damn Lestrade,” Sherlock mutters, glancing at his phone. “We’ll have to hurry to meet our dinner reservations. We need to go home and get--oh.” Sherlock drops his arm just as the cab pulls up and opens the door on auto pilot, not looking at anything in particular as he slumps onto the seat.

“Sherlock, what?”

“221 Baker Street,” Sherlock orders, leaning forward before slumping back into his seat and staring blankly at me. “Dress code, John.”

I feel as though it’s my turn for a blank stare. “What about it?”

“There is one.”

“So?”

“So…” Sherlock looks uncomfortable, and I feel as though I begin to understand why.

“Sherlock.”

“No, John. It’s...fine.  I will cancel my reservation, and we will go somewhere...not so unforgivably pretentious for dinner.”

He’s looking out the window chewing on his bottom lip, obviously far more aggravated about this than he should be. It dawns on me that he might actually be worried about embarrassing me, which after years of fielding barbs about my wardrobe makes no sense at all.

That anxious, eager look in his eyes puts me in mind of the day we went to see Baker Street. In hindsight he’d been...nervous that day. Concerned I wouldn't agree. Something twists in my chest and I find myself smiling.

“Don’t change the reservations,” I say, reaching across the seat and wrapping his fingers in my hand, something I just realized I had wanted to do for the past few hours. “I’m sure I can dig out something that will get me through the door.”

He glances sidelong at me and his lips twitch.

“We need to get you a proper suit, John.” Is all he says.

“Hmm. Yeah,” I answer, smiling and twining our fingers together.

****~~~

We shower together to save time which of course means we really save no time at all, between washing and stroking and kissing. Frankly, after the first brush of his lips on my throat, I was about to call a halt to the whole evening and just… god. But he planned this thing so carefully. It would be like kicking a proddy puppy.

We shave, battling for mirror space and we’ve gotten so good at it that it’s not dangerous anymore, and I run up the stairs to get dressed with Sherlock shouting a countdown at me.

It’s at the back of my wardrobe, hanging in a bag behind a bunch of Mary’s dresses. I’d bought it for Harry’s wedding years ago and couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it after they split because it was too damned expensive. Sherlock thinks style is a mystery to me, but he’s wrong. I just have a different set of priorities.

The suit still looks perfect, as if it had just been pressed. It’s dark blue, which was Harry’s favorite color when I bought it. It feels...odd, after so long. I’ve grown accustomed to my normal wardrobe and this feels... well good, frankly. The light wool is far finer than anything else I own, and the lining is soft. It’s not bespoke, like most of Sherlock’s wardrobe seems to be, but it’s well tailored. I smile at my reflection in the wardrobe mirror. If it has the same effect on Sherlock that it had on Mary, the whole bloody mess surrounding that awful wedding will have been worth it.

“John… if you can’t find anything don’t worry, I’ll just steal a dinner jacket from one the waiters or something,” Sherlock shouts from his room.

“Don’t think that’ll be necessary,” I try unsuccessfully to keep the smile out of my voice while tying my tie in front of the mirror over the mantle.

“Ugh fine, let’s see what monstrous thing you’ve dug out from…”

Oh, the look on his face as he pops his head around the corner-- the widening eyes, the parting lips, the quick intake of breath-- priceless. Well worth the cost of ten suits. Which I may have to buy just to see it again. He narrows his eyes at me.

“Let me tie that. You’re rubbish at it.” Sherlock growls, stalking up behind me and batting my hands away, staring at our reflection in the mirror as he fiddles with the silk. “You need a Windsor… he mutters, warm breath puffing past my ear. “Or a Pratt..no, Windsor, I think…” His hands deftly fold the tie into a complex knot that ends up looking simple and refined when he snugs it up to my collar.

He’s remains standing behind me, studying our reflection in the mirror.

“Why don’t you normally wear clothing of this calibre, John. You let everyone think you have no taste.” His fingertips absently stroke the soft wool sleeves

“Better to occasionally surprise the poncy snobs who assume I have no taste than spend every day trying to prove I do.” I smirk, meeting his eyes in the mirror. “Don’t we have some dinner to get to or something?”

Sherlock snatches his phone from his pocket and swears as he checks the time before grabbing my hand and pulling me out the door, muttering imprecations against anyone who might be foolish enough to give our table away.

~~~

“Sherlock, there are pillars. _Marble_ pillars.”

“You observations never fail to impress, John.”

“Anything hiding behind pillars is likely to be extremely expensive and pretentious.”

“An excellent deduction. You’re quite right, predictably, however, you’ve missed a vital element.”

“And what would that be?”

“ _Delicious._ ”

“This, from someone who can barely be arsed to eat takeaway.”

“This is as different from take away as that suit is from your jumpers, John. This is food that deserves attention. Stop ogling the decor, the entrance is just here.”

“It just so happens, I was ogling you.”

“Ah! Monsieur Holmes the _younger_! It is ages since we have seen you here. Your brother, on the other hand--”

“About whom the less spoken the better, Guillaume.”

“Just so, Mr. Holmes, just so.”

“It’s good to see you. Thank you for accommodating my request on such short notice.”

 “But of course! I have reserved the _perfect_ table for you, if you’ll please follow me, it is just here, in the alcove. Good, yes? Perfect. Please be seated, Marielle will be by in just a moment. She is quite thrilled, you know, that you are here. Enjoy your evening, Mr. Holmes.”

“Sherlock, do you know every restaurateur in London on a first name basis?”

“Only those of interest.”

“In other words, former criminals. You’re rubbing off on me, Sherlock. Guillaume there had a very interesting set of calluses on his right hand.”

“Brilliant, John! No, really, I’m not being facetious. At the moment. Do you have a wine preference?”

“Whiskey. No, I’m kidding. Why don’t you order for us? You’ll save me from making a complete arse of myself mispronouncing the names of all...this. Surprise me.”

“If you wish. Though…”

“Don’t look like that, Sherlock, this is brilliant. Honestly, I’m glad Mary decided to jump ship and spend all our money in Paris. After everything, I bloody well _deserve_ this.”

“Well, it was meant for Mary. If it had been meant for you, it would be quite different. Ah, Marielle.”

“Good evening Mr. Holmes. It is such a pleasure to see you again! If I might make a suggestion for the pair of you, we have just launched our winter seasonal tasting menu. It is superb.”

“Excellent, though no shellfish for Dr. Watson. As your skills as a sommelier far outstripe my own, please choose appropriate wines as well.”

“It is my pleasure, Mr. Holmes. I shall return shortly.”

“Sherlock, you remembered I’m allergic to shellfish.”

“This surprises you?”

“It...It doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you’d let take up space in your mind palace.”

“I can’t have you kieling over mid way through the concert. It would be disruptive. Besides, you'd be surprised the sort of things I store away about you.”

“I shudder to think. Or, actually, maybe not. D’you have enough room, the settings are pretty close together.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, John, this entire ambiance-- the privacy of the booth, the lighting, even the texture of the upholstery is meant to promote intimacy. Unless you’d _rather_ I moved away?”

“Good god no. Though, if the point is to focus on the food, maybe stroking my thigh isn’t the best idea…”

“Shall I stop John? Maybe I should. Maybe there are other areas you’d prefer me to pay attention to? Perhaps here, below your jaw, or...I don’t know, somewhere in the vicinity of your...”

“You. Are going to kill me.”

“Mr. Holmes, Dr. Watson, an amuse bouches of Braised kohlrabi with brunoise of winter vegetables and truffle emulsion, accompanied by a Catalonian Cava.”

“Thank you, Marielle. John, you’re staring.”

“Well, it seems to me that there are things worth staring at. Principally you. You... fit here. Not just, like, here against me, though that’s amazing. I mean here. In this... opulence.”

“Do I? And you don’t?”

“Hell no. I can fake it until I have to order, but you’re to the manner born. I mean are you or rather, were you? I know you so well but I hardly know you.”

“You know me better, perhaps, than anyone else in the world.”

“Admit it, though, Sherlock, that’s a pretty low bar. You deduced my entire life story within five minutes of meeting me. It hardly seems fair that I don’t know anything about your past.”

“Marielle! Perfect timing as usual.”

“Thank you Mr. Holmes. Here we have a Potage Crecy, composed of carrots, leeks, potatoes and finished with creme fraiche and fresh thyme. Served with Kongsgaard chardonnay, 2003.”

“Incredible.”

“I can feel my arteries hardening as we eat. Totally worth it.”

“Quite.”

“Seriously, Sherlock, I barely know you in some ways. There are gaps.”

“Why is this troubling? My past has served its purpose; it has fashioned me into who I am-- the man you know. _Intimately_.”

“Jesus, there’s plenty of food coming. You don’t have to look as though you’ll devour _me_.  And, it’s true, what yous said. Which...well. Considering how bloody brilliant you’ve turned out, you can hardly blame me for wanting to know how it happened.”

“Neither of us like talking about the past that shaped us, John. Fortunately, our...sharper edges fit together nicely.”

“That remains to be seen.”

“Was that…”

“Double entendre.”

“So you do know some French.”

“Hardly. I can whisper sweet nothings in your ear in Pashto.”

“...I didn’t know you spoke Pashto.”

“You haven’t caught any Afghani terrorists lately.”

“I’ll try harder.”

“Actually, don’t. If could go the whole rest of my life without uttering another word of Pashto I would die a happy man. Marielle, if what you’re carrying tastes as good as it smells, I can die a happy man _now_.”

“It certainly does, Dr. Watson. Here we have a seared white sturgeon finished with caviar beurre blanc. Accompanied by a Pierre Sparr pinot blanc. Enjoy.”

“My God, this is my favorite thing so far. It’s amazing. I have to say though, I’m astounded that you’re not more upset about missing the whole Pashto thing. I wonder what else about me you don’t know.”

“John Watson, you’re trying to draw me out.”

“Yeah? And?”

“Well. It’s working.”

“I bet I can make it more interesting. I’ll ask you a question, and you get to choose to either answer it or agree to do something I ask you to do. Same with me.”

“Truth or dare.”

“How the hell d’you--”

“Murder, two years ago. Well. Manslaughter anyway. Unintentional. I almost got it wrong...misunderstood the motivation. I thought the boyfriend was trying to be clever. Turns out it was a dare gone wrong.”

“So you think it’s stupid.”

“Obviously.”

“But you’re still going to do it.”

“Absolutely. And I’ll win.”

“It’s not really something you can win, Sherlock.”

“Watch me.”

“Ok… I’ll go first. What was your favorite hiding spot as a child?”

“A hollow stump next to the...hmm.”

“Next to the _what_ , Sherlock.”

“...Stables.”

“Ah. The stables, he says. To the manner born indeed. Or maybe manor would be the better word?”

“Oh, shut up. My turn. What did you enjoy the most about your time in Afghanistan.”

“ _Enjoy_? What? Um. The importance of...I was essential. Needed. Almost always. That was…good.”

“Gentlemen, a palate cleanser of blood orange and rosewater sorbet.”

“Thank you Marielle. Ok Sherlock, It’s my turn. What do you fantasize about? Sexually speaking.”

“...Dare.”

“What, really? Mmmm. Fine. You have to find a way to stay in continuous physical contact with me for the remainder of dinner.”

“With pleasure.”

“Sherlock Holmes, when you want to be, you are actually sorta... sweet.”

“Let it  be our secret.”

“Might have to tell Mary. Though I think it’d be better if she discovered it on her own.”

“If you could change anything about me, what would it be?”

“That’s hard.”

“I should think it would be the easiest thing in the world. I’m an insufferable housemate. I’m obnoxious and abrasive, borderline abusive, I have few social graces, I lack empathy and sympathy. Hell, _you’ve_ even said I’m a machine--”

“I’ve always regretted saying that, Sherlock. You are not a machine. And I wouldn’t change any of the rest...that’s just-- who you are. No, I think the only thing I’d change about you is your idiotic notion that sentiment is some sort of weakness.”

“Oh! Brilliant. I took care of that this morning. Or rather you did.”

“You did? I mean I did? What?”

“Yes, it was epiphany number three.”

“Sorry, when were you having epiphanies?”

“In the shower obviously.”

“What, this morning?”

“Yes.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“In case you forgot, John, my mouth was otherwise occupied.”

“Will they kick us out?”

“Who? When? Why?”

“Guillaume. Now. Because I’m about to tackle you and put that wicked mouth of yours to other uses.”

“It’s possible but improbable. However, you’re about to have witnesses.”

“Damn. No, no, not you, Marielle. This git is positively _naughty_.”

“Then I can see nothing has changed since we were first acquainted. Perhaps Monsieur Holmes will be better behaved if he busies his over-used mouth with this delightful entrecote of beef with creme fraiche and a cracked peppercorn sauce served over garlic scented escaoutoun. ”

“The chances of a food, no matter how fine, halting the mffff--”

“Genius, Marielle! Though I don’t supposed shoving beef in someone’s face is really done in polite company.”

“This is possible. How fortunate it is that you are not _in_ polite company, Dr. Watson.”

“Sherlock, you are to leave that lovely woman the biggest tip anyone’s ever left a server.”

“Mmmm.”

“Sherlock, the wine actually makes it taste better.”

“Hmmmmmmm.”

“Dear god your voice...your voice should be illegal.”

“Mmm hmmm.”

“William Sherlock Scott Holmes, you stop….fellating that fork before...God. What am I? Sixteen? Before. I. Things. For reasons. Stop. Epiphanies! The third one. Tell me about it.”

“I could, John, but given your reactions to other stimuli this evening, I don’t think it will be the distraction you’re looking for.”

“Tell me anyway.”

“Very well. I realized that I still consider love, generally speaking, a chemical defect of the worst kind--a blinding, dangerous, perception-altering liability.”

“That...how can you--”

“However, it seems that applied to you specifically, the theory falls apart. As you are the exception to so many rules, it should come as no surprise that, instead of blinding, loving you is illuminating.”

“Oh. Sherlock--”

“So illuminating, in fact that I made the first two discoveries that morning after mere moments of indulging in the carnal manifestation of that sentiment.”

“Care to share?”

“The first of three of five realizations took me rather by surprise, and occurred rather rapidly the moment you took me in your hand and started stroking me.”

“Mmmm. God.”

“I realized that I had badly miscalculated the motivation behind many of the murders I have encountered. What? John?”

“So, while I was stroking you off in the shower, you were having epiphanies about crime solving. And you don’t see why this is, um, _mildly_ upsetting?”

“Ah. As usual, you’re reacting before you have all the data. Have I taught you nothing?”

“I’m pretty sure the fact you’re still sucking breath is proof you’ve taught me patience. Or at least forbearance. Enlighten me, Sherlock. What staggering crime-related discoveries were you making while my fucking my fist?”

“I’ve always considered the term ‘crime of passion’ at worst idiotic and at best incomplete. It never occurred to me that physical pleasure and the intensity of emotions associated with acts of love would, in and of themselves, be sufficient motivation to murder.  Until now. Revelation number two uncovered the fact that, though I know that escalation of this nature is not acceptable, I couldn’t care less.”

“So, let me get this straight Sherlock. Within seconds of laying my hands on you, you’d figured out you’d kill for us and that you don’t care how wrong that is and then threw over a philosophy to which you’ve clung your whole adult life? This is what you’re saying?”

“Not good?”

“No. Not good. Brilliant, though. Amazing. We’re both completely mad, you for saying all this shit and me for loving it. You realize that right?”

“For god’s sake, John, I knew you were mad from the moment you walked into the lab at Barts. I told you then in fact. Of _course_ you’re mad. You’re unpredictable. And that’s _brilliant_.”

“A high compliment, coming from you. Huh. Where did this salad come from?”

“Marielle brought them while you were expounding on how amazing I am.”

“I didn’t notice.”

“For all your brilliance, you can be singularly unobservant.”

“I’m actually going to chalk this up to being drunk. Which, I suddenly realize, I am.  You know what this means though? The next time you’re stumped about a case, apparently all I need to do is shag you and you’ll figure everything out.”

“I don’t get _stumped_ about cases.”

“Yeah, you do.”

“But I might start.”

“We don’t...strictly speaking, need to reserve that activity for that specific circumstance.”

“Strictly speaking, we don’t have to _reserve_ it at all, John.  The angle of the table and length of table cloth obfuscates my hand from the rest of the room when it’s at this precise location which just so happens to be on top of your--”

“Jesus christ. Sherlock, you must really hate the symphony.”

“How exactly did you come to _that_ conclusion?”

“You’re apparently doing everything in your power to ensure that we skip it entirely in favor of fucking off to Baker Street and...well. Fucking.”

“John, remember what you said in the alcove last night?”

“Jesus, was that just last night? What did I say?”

“You said you had been _teasing_ me. I believe the phrase is ‘turnabout is fair play.’”

“Damn.”

“Marielle is coming with our dessert course, John. You’re nowhere near decent.”

“It’s your fault, and I don’t care, and I bet she doesn’t either.”

“A gâteau de mille-feuilles with dark chocolate crème pâtissière.”

“Thank you Marielle. Also, coffee please. Lots of coffee. All the coffee.”

“Of course, Dr. Watson.”

“Sherlock, what did I tell you about fork fellating?”

“Be glad I have something to distract me from what I actually want to be doing.”

“Which is?”

“Writhing in pleasure on my back while you _take_ me.”

“Oh. My fucking god. Tell me. How?” 

“I want you on me, your weight pressing me down on the bed, and I want you in me. I want to give you that, John. I want you to _take_ it. I want that so badly that I am apparently getting an erection just thinking about it.”

“Welcome to my world, Sherlock. Incidentally, I win.”

“Win? What?”

“You took a dare and told me the truth about your fantasy anyway.”

“So I did. There’s still a bit of creme there. Dinner’s not technically over, I could stop touching you.”

“Yeah, but you won’t”

“Apparently not. Will you John?”

“God _Sherlock_. Frankly I’m astounded I’m not currently taking you right here on this table.”

“That would be...inappropriate. I suppose.”

“You suppose right. Now pay and get us out of here before I get us thrown out. How long do symphonies last?”

"A damn sight better than either of us will."

"Hah!"

 

 


	38. Chapter 38

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good freaking God, I'm so sorry for taking so long between chapters. Real life has a stunningly inappropriate way of intruding on the smut-filled lives of imaginary people. 
> 
> In this chapter, their date continues. In the next? Pure, unadulterated porn. Yay.

The goldfish, as Mycroft calls them, may not be getting it all wrong. This _dating_ lark has gone quite satisfactorily so far. Though I had tailored this evening for Mary, it seems that the sentiment behind our activities is as important if not more so than what we’re actually doing.

John’s not stopped smiling since we left dinner, a fact that gives me no small amount of satisfaction, though it still surprises me that I of all people engender these feelings in anyone.

I link my arm in his as we walk towards Barbican Centre and his smile twitches wider and he glances up at me, swaying into my space. I find myself fighting the urge to stop in the middle of the sidewalk and gather him into my arms and I marvel again at how quickly my responses to him have changed since the day we first kissed.

It’s as though a dam has broken...I want all the contact I’ve denied myself for years and I want it all at once. I want him pressed up against me, touching me in as many places as possible, I want to breathe his breath and feel his fingers in my hair and press against his skin until I don’t know where I end and he begins. I want a confusing tangle of limbs and sweat soaked sheets and--

“All right, Sherlock?” John’s smile wavers. I tuck him closer to my side and it’s back again, bright and warm.

“Never better.”

“Only you, uh, moaned. I think.”

“Probably.”

“Care to share?”

“Later, John.”

“Ah.”

We merge with the stream of people flowing through the unassuming glass doors and I sigh.

“Sherlock?”

“This place is hideous.”

“Well, it’s not exactly my taste, but hideous is putting it a bit strongly.”

“I’m not the only one who thinks so,” I snort as we walk through the horrible lobby. “It was voted most hideous building in London a few years back. It’s London’s finest example of the brutalist architectural movement. No, I’m serious, that is actually what it’s called. Even the acoustics were terrible until they sank five hundred thousand pounds into renovating it in 2005. Mycroft had no small amount to say about that, let me assure you.”

Programs materialize in our hands as we pass into the hall itself. Apparently the ushers here share similar a skill set with Marielle. John and I are ten rows back and two stalls left of dead center. Even in this monstrosity of a hall there are acoustic sweet spots. John will have a slight advantage given the new height and tilt of the ceiling baffles. He won’t appreciate it, but that’s not really the point.

“Tell me about what we’ll see,” he says, inclining towards me.

“It’s all in here,” I say, twitching my program open.

“Yeah, but I’d rather hear it from you, Sherlock.”

John places his hand over mine, closing the program and doesn’t remove it. I stare at his fingers, twined lightly in mine on my thigh and feel my throat contract at the simple intimacy.

“By the time Brahms finished this symphony he was already being called Beethoven’s successor.” I find my voice finally. “He was a perfectionist.  He spent over fifteen years honing his skills in orchestration with his first symphony roiling around in his head… In fact, the violin concerto that begins this concert was initially meant to be a symphony.”

John’s absolute, undivided attention is as intoxicating here as it is at a crime scene.

“Have you played the concerto?”

“You’ll recognize parts of it,” I nervously dig the edge of my nail into the callus on the tip of my ring finger, contemplating the nature of the music we’re about to listen to.

“Have you ever played the whole thing?”

“Yes, once. When I was young.” His silence is an invitation to explain. “I use music as catharsis, now. The math--the technique behind it is constant and calming. I am a technically adept musician. Some pieces...need more than a technique to do them justice,” It’s hard for me to explain this, why I don’t play much of the music I listen to.

“Sentiment,” John says, ghosting fingertips over my knuckles. Of course he would understand. I nod, relieved. “Well, maybe you’ll be able to now that…” He pauses, frowning, doubting and I find myself staring, wondering if he’s not right.

“You may be onto something, John. We’ll have to experiment.” A grin splashes across his features. “Since I met you, this concerto reminds me of you.” Apparently I can’t keep anything to myself anymore. His murmured response is lost in the general rustle of people taking their places around us, but the warm look in his eye before he diverts his attention to the musicians taking their seats on stage is commentary enough.

I slip the program out from under our joined hands and flick through it, bypassing the brief biography of Brahms where they likely focus on all the wrong things and sigh.

“Oh.”

John tears his eyes away from where the basses are setting up shop and glances at me.

“What?”

“They’ve changed soloists.”

“Who is it now?”

“Aarto Eskola.  Twelve years ago his violin was stolen from his flat in Helsinki. I recovered it.

“Twelve years ago? You couldn’t have been older than twenty two? Twenty three? How’d you know him?”

“We were at Oxford together.”

“Ah. Friends?”

“What do you think? He was grateful to get the violin back before he had to report it to the authorities or the insurance company. We respected one and other. He is a very gifted musician.”

The lights dim and John’s attention is once again riveted curiously on the stage. The conductor comes out, followed by Aarto, who looks as imperious as ever, and there she is, shining in his hands.

I don’t often covet things, but when I do, it’s with finger-itching intensity. I’ve never stolen from a client...well, except for that one time, but it had taken all my willpower to relinquish that violin after I’d been foolish enough to play it after finding it. Fortunately for Aarto, my need to ferret out the truth and be right outweighed everything. It still does.

John’s fingers flutter in my hand and I remember that first night, telling Lestrade to disregard my deductions about the identity of the cabby’s shooter. My need to be right outweighs _almost_ everything, I amend, smiling.

A hush descends as the orchestra tunes to Aarto’s violin.  The concerto begins softly, and I see John lean back in his seat only to tense again at the first of many transitions from calm to tension that is the hallmark of this piece and the next.

The exposition ends definitively and I turn my attention from John to Aarto as he hurls himself into the complex cadenza that opens the his part, flashing through double stops and broken arpeggios with ferocious grace.

John is as unexpectedly active a listener. I find myself more and more distracted by his reactions to the music.  His palm presses against mine and I can feel his thigh tense as he reacts. Mid way through the piece, I start to form suspicions. By the end of the second movement, I’m forming theories and as the piece comes to a grand finish, there is only one question left.

“Clarinet or Oboe?” I ask, leaning over and speaking directly in his ear so he can hear over the loud applause of a completely deserved standing ovation.

John bursts out laughing as Aarto takes his second bow and moves off the stage.

“Clarinet. I was rubbish at it.”

John’s grin is infectious and, before I am aware of my actions, my fingers have found their way to the nape of his neck. It’s a fleeting, tender thing, this kiss. I savor it, memorizing the quick warm brush of his lips against mine, the soft puff of his breath, the casual intimacy of it that I find utterly remarkable.

An audible sniff sounds disdainfully from behind us and John stiffens slightly as our lips part. I roll my eyes and prepare to break the woman behind us into tiny little pieces, but John’s arm slips around my waist and he twists us so that we’re facing forward.  He pulls me close and I momentarily forget why I’m bristling.

“I don’t want to waste one moment of this evening on the likes of _that_ ,” he mutters, and his smile is wry as he tugs on my waist. I find myself in complete agreement realizing that contemplating the texture of the short, soft hairs at the nape of his neck brings me far more satisfaction than any embarrassment I could have visited on whoever-she-is. I wonder how many more epiphanies I can have in one day.

He has questions about the orchestra configuration and the acoustics of the hall and damn near everything else and we pass the fifteen minute interval deep in conversation until the gongs chime and the lights dim. His arm never loosens around me.

Half way through the first movement, John’s fingers tighten around mine. His eyes are wide when he shifts his attention from the spectacle of the orchestra to me but they narrow in a moment of keen regard before returning again to the stage.

I try momentarily to deduce his thoughts.  I can’t even guess, and that’s marvelous. It’s one of the best things about John; his ability to confound me. Continually. It should not be possible. Objectively, I’ve met more brilliant people--smarter, better educated. But they were just different kinds of _dull_. John is...not. It’s incredible.

The audience springs to their feet after the last note has died and John leaps with them, his face split wide in a delighted grin. Frankly, I rarely stand for ovations. I find the crowd in London far too generous. However tonight is an exception. It was a virtually flawless performance, a masterful interpretation.

“That was incredible!” John says over the sound of clapping and bravo. “Really amazing. Why don’t we do this all the time?”

“We will certainly make it a habit, since you so clearly enjoy it.”

“Wonderful. It’s over now, though? Everyone’s leaving. Let’s get the hell back home. I have things I want to do to you.”

“Would these... things... have anything to do with what we discussed at dinner?” What was meant to sound sly comes out breathless and that would annoy me, except it makes John smile as we slide out of our row of seats and into the press of people in the isle.

“You’re the genius. Deduce it,” he murmurs, and takes advantage of the crush of people to brush his fingers along my thigh before catching my twitching hand in his and as I curse under my breath.

These idiots. For God’s sake, how hard it is to make a quick and orderly retreat in a straight line? It’s a superb kind of torture, John pressing up against me and having no way to decently make use of his proximity.

Sod decency, I decide. I’ll just--

“Sherlock! John!”  

For one shining moment, I think John hasn’t heard and we’ll make it out to the lobby without incident. The moment passes as John startles and surreptitiously slips his fingers from my grasp. My heart hammers bitterly. _Ridiculous_.

“ _Lestrade_?” John’s smiling incredulously over several shoulders at my new arch enemy as we pass through the lobby doors.

“Don’t look so surprised. Everyone enjoys a bit of culture here and there. That was marvelous,” Lestrade says, sidling up to us with a smile.

“Yeah, really good. I’ve never been before. You here on your own?”

“Wife’s in the loo. You met her, I think, that night when...Say. Where _is_ Mary?” Lestrade looks around expectantly then stares at me, eyes widening slightly in surprise. Unfortunately Lestrade is rarely as unobservant as I claim. I would give give up a locked room murder to get us out of here before the inevitable happens.

“Off to Paris with Molly to drain our bank accounts,” John says easily, his eyes focusing over Lestrade’s shoulder on the scowling approach of his wife.

“Ah. Well…Wait, accounts? Plural?” John nods, gnawing nervously on his lower lip as he watches the glowering Mrs. Lestrade approach from behind Greg.

“Not going to hare off again are we?” she states, grasping Lestrade’s arm possessively. This is not a question and her smile is merely the baring of her teeth as she rakes her gaze over us. “So, it looks like the papers were right,” she finishes, and John quickly grasps my arm, squeezing a warning before I can react.  

“Jesus, Karen, could you not?” Lestrade sighs, the smile freezing on his face.

I’m tempted to feel sorry for him except that he’s got himself into this position both by calling attention to himself and by marrying that harpy in the first place.

“Oh no, I’m afraid you have the wrong idea.” John laughs and something ugly twists in my chest.

On some level I know this is necessary. Although I don’t give one gracious damn about conforming to idiotic social stereotypes, it’s important to John to keep some semblance of normality, so I will make it important to me. I force myself to relax and only then realize that he’s still hanging onto my arm.

“ _My_ spouse is perfectly aware of all  _my_ activities during her absence,” John finishes, linking his arm through mine and turning us away, smiling tightly over his shoulder at Lestrade’s ashen face.

“Nice running into you like this, Greg. Not a murder in sight. We’ll have to go for pints at some point,” he calls and Greg nods weakly as we enter the throng of people heading out the doors.  “Sodding bitch,” he mutters, and warmth pools in my chest as he squeezes my bicep briefly before dropping my arm to accommodate a veritable traffic jam of pensioners actually queuing in front of the fucking doors.

I fight the urge to cry “Fire,” not only because Lestrade would probably be forced to arrest me, but because it would embarrass John and likely further impede our efforts to leave rather than alleviating them. Finally we’re through. I can hear John heave a sigh of relief as he walks swiftly off to our left.

“John,” I say, catching him up and gripping his arm.

“Nope. Not now. Cab. Home. Things to do, remember? Priorities, Sherlock!” He’s smiling and surprisingly, laughter bubbles up and escapes my lips.

We make our way two blocks down, away from the milling crowd and I flag us down a cab. John settles close by my side and leans against me sighing.

“How did you know about Lestrade’s wife?” I ask eventually, and he snorts, wrinkling his nose.

“It’s usually the people doing the wrong thing themselves who are most suspicious of others.” He sighs unhappily. “Greg’s a nice sorta bloke. Doesn’t deserve that.”

I decide to keep my current opinions of Lestrade’s worthiness to myself and can’t help but notice that John’s still frowning. I stare at him for a moment, trying to suss out the cause of his continued discomfort. Something extremely unnerving occurs to me.

“John, what we are doing is not remotely the same as--”

“What? No! God, no. Sorry. I was just thinking about-- how to deal with it. Us. You know. In public. We can’t just…” John frowns harder and strokes my palm absently with his thumb, staring out the window at London flying by.

“Are you ashamed?” I ask because I have to know and asking is more expedient at this point than deducing it. John snaps his head around and meets my eyes.

“Absolutely not.” His unwavering gaze makes that assertion unassailable and I relax slightly. “Just the opposite in fact. I don’t want to hide us, ever. I just don't want people always jumping to the wrong conclusion.”

Oh. Of course. I can be thick when I try.

“You don’t care if people think you’re gay, for all you’ve denied it in the past,” I say quietly. He snorts and rolls his eyes then stares at our hands where they are linked between us.  “You care that they think you’re unfaithful.”

“Nailed it,” he mutters, tightening his fingers around mine.  Truth be told, I’d rather be nailing something else at the moment, but that is neither here nor there.

“There is a simple solution that you’re overlooking,” I say, relaxing back into the seat, relieved. This is a fixable problem. The other would have been far more difficult.

“And that is?”

“Your blog. Obviously. Simply explain the situation and tell everyone to sod off if they don’t like it. Everyone we interact with on a daily basis reads it and anyone who doesn’t won’t be likely to care one way or the other anyway.”

John takes a moment or two to consider and his smile grows.

“You know, you’re right.” he says. “It really could be that easy. Amazing. For all you keep saying it’s ‘not your area’ you’re actually not terrible at this sort of thing.”

I bark out a laugh, feeling his fond regard wash over me as he laces our fingers together between us. I catch his eye and hold his gaze, rubbing my thumb into the cup of his palm. His eyes darken and his lips part and the atmosphere takes a turn for the dramatically sensual as is, I am discovering, often the case between us. Which is precisely to my liking.

 

 


	39. Chapter 39

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here there be porn!

It continues to shock me how quickly I can change gears where Sherlock is concerned. It has never taken so ridiculously little to shift from hilarity to arousal or anger to arousal or arousal to almost coming in my trousers like a bloody adolescent.

Much like I am about to do in the back of this bloody cab on the way back from the bloody symphony because Sherlock bloody Holmes has graduated from rubbing his thumb into my palm to rubbing his palm against my painfully erect cock.  

“Sherlock, fuck, we’re almost home.”

“Yup.” The plosive ‘p’ explodes from his lips in a soft puff of air against my neck and it could be a claymore mine if my body’s reactions are anything to go by. He _devastates_ me and we’re not even, you know, doing that much back here. Some heavy petting. A little hushed gasping. Nothing this cab hasn’t seen before a thousand times, certainly nothing like what we got up to in that other cab. But vivid in my mind’s eye is the vision of his lean, naked body stretched out below me, surrounded by steam, water running in rivulets down between his legs as he throws his head back and strokes his cock, staring at me from under those heavy, dark lashes….

“Fuck,” I bat his hands away from my groin. “Seriously? Best trousers I own. Stop a bloody minute.” He chuckles deep and low, but obligingly moves his hands to my thighs where they rest, lightly gripping, his thumbs rubbing firm circles into my adductor longus, massaging tension _into_ them as surely as my fingers stroke lightning into his beautifully disheveled curls.

He bows his head, pressing his brow against my shoulder and moans quietly as I rub against the follicles and it’s all I can do to keep from thrusting up into his hands. He’s impossibly responsive to my touch, rocking against me, nudging up into the pressure of my fingers with small sounds that make me yearn to both pull him into a tender embrace and fist my hands into his hair and yank his head back, exposing the tender, soft flesh of his throat and mark him with my teeth.

Given his commentary at dinner, I’m fairly sure I know which version of events Sherlock would prefer and I may never get over my surprise at THAT little admission. How is it that the two most forceful people I know in my life have the same submissive streak in bed? My cock twitches just thinking about a him, stretched out and moaning, writhing under my hands, pinned by his own...fuck.

“Ugh, I need space, Sherlock.” I growl through a sheepish smile. “Give me some room.” There’s the dark chuckle again. Sherlock leaves a hand on my thigh but turns from me and leans back against the seat.  He lets his head drop to the upholstery, giving me a stunning view of his long, pale, kissable, lickable, bitable, neck. Just. Fuck. He drags fingers up his throat and tugs idly at his tie and I stroke the back of his hand where it rests, warm against my leg.

It’s then that I notice the sound, barely audible above the hum of the tyres on the tarmac, it’s like a deep, protracted moan. I remember it from the shower. He’s fucking _purring_. I can’t fight back the hysterical giggle that breaks the air between us and his eyes sparkle as glances at me sidelong, his gaze dipping to my crotch where, what do you know? I’ve started palming myself through my trousers _without even realizing it_. Well sod this. I get up on my knees and lean towards him until my lips are millimeters away from the delicate shell of his ear.

“When we get home, I’m going to take you to bed. I’m going to slip your shirt off your beautiful shoulders and I’m going to wrap its silk around your wrists. I’m going to fucking _immobilize_ you and take your body in every way I can think of. I’m going to tease and bite and lick you until you’re literally begging me to give you relief and then I’m going to make you come so hard you forget what a murder even _is_. And I’m going to love making you beg for it. Why? I have no idea. But I will. And you’ll love it too. Am I right?”

The question is superfluous. I know I’m right because, during the course of my little speech, Sherlock’s hand has tensed where it still rests against my thigh and his breath hitches, a soft moan interrupting the thrumming purr that--I still can’t understand how that’s physically possible. And I’m a bloody doctor.

The cab turns and I feel the offset double bump of the manhole covers that signify that we’ve turned on to the south end of Baker Street. Sherlock’s head lolls towards me with the inertia of the car and his eyes, when they meet mine are bright, glinting stars set in the darkness of his hair. His unshuttered expression is full of naked, pure desire.

Red-bitten lips curl around a single, unspoken word.

“ _Please_.”

My heart simultaneously contracts and pounds faster, which should hurt far more than it does, and I reach for him, burying my fingers in his curls, pressing our foreheads together.

“God, yes, Sherlock. Absolutely. Anything.”

The cab pulls over to stop in a space three doors down from ours. The next thing of which I’m fully aware, I’m bursting through the door to our flat and we are rushing towards Sherlock’s bedroom pulling at cufflinks and ties. As soon as he shuts the door after us I’m on him.

I crowd him against the wall, thrusting a thigh between his legs and pulling his face roughly down to slam our mouths together. He gasps my name against my lips and opens to my biting assault, the fingers of one hand carding through my hair while the other tugs at my tie.

Our suit coats end up thrown over a chair and I get to work on the buttons of his shirt. The fabric parts, drawing back across the hard expanse of his chest, the deepening vee revealing more and more smooth skin. I tug shirt tails from his trousers and the the folds of soft fabric hang loose and open off his frame.

“John,” his voice is a shaking shadow of it’s strident self as I slide my hands across his chest. His skin...god. His _skin_. Like the rest of him, it’s so damn sensitive. Gooseflesh chases my fingers and the palms of my hands as I smooth over his pectoral muscles and down his lean, hard stomach to the waistband of his trousers and back up again.

I lick at the small bumps above his heart and barely suppress a growl when Sherlock arches into my lips, letting his head fall back against the wall.  I realize suddenly that my fascination with this throat might border on the pathologic. Or fetishistic. Potato, potahto. _Whatever_.

I curl my fingers in the hair at the back of his head and pull hard. He lets out a startled gasp and a groan and bends backward, arching away from the wall as I pull lower, his back bowing beautifully. He reaches for my shoulders but I catch his wrist in my hand and shake my head.

“Hands against the wall Sherlock. Don’t move.”  

“God, _John_ ,” he gasps and flattens his palms against the wall behind him. His hips tilt forward and his cock juts up against my stomach. I press myself against him hard, leaning into his belly and his chest, trapping both our cocks between us, under far too many layers of clothing, and his hips twitch and buck as he tries hard for more friction. I angle away, not allowing him one ounce of pressure and he whimpers, pressing his head back further into my palm.

Remembering his sensitivity from  the previous night, I lick my way up his sternum and quickly purse lips around his left nipple and suck it suddenly between my teeth.

His body convulses violently against me and shouts something unintelligible that sounds vaguely French before inhaling with a hiss as I mouth that fierce little jut of flesh, worrying it with tongue and teeth and relishing the aftershocks as he quivers and shakes against me, fingertips scrabbling against the wall though his palms never leave it.

He’s obeying. _Sherlock_ is _obeying_. What the actual fuck is that about? The thought’s enough to make me damn near come by itself. Which would defeat the purpose of trying to spare my trousers.  

I release his hair and God damn if he doesn’t hold his position perfectly, though his body stills as he waits for what comes next.

I tug on his shoulder and he straightens, leaning back to rest broad shoulders against the wall. I tug his belt off and quickly divest him of his trousers, pants and socks, then stand back to observe my work.

His face, neck and the top of his chest are flushed and his mouth... god. The filthy things I want to to do to that mouth about now. Sherlock watches me hawkishly, taking in every move, doubtless trying to figure out what I’ll do next. Frankly, I wish he’d figure it out and tell me because I have no idea where to go from here.

His eyes sweep over my face and my body-- somehow I’m still completely clothed. His eyes linger at my throat before snapping back up to mine.  His pupils dilate, and his breath hitches as his gaze flicks from my throat to my eyes and back again.  

It’s my tie. It’s untied, yoked around my neck. I trace the silk and watch his eyes follow the path of my fingers as I grasp it and pull it from my shoulders. Those lips, full and bruised, fall open as I lean towards him.

“This...This is what you want.” I murmur, leaning against him. “ I think you’ve been wanting the feeling of this silk around your wrists all night.”

The words puff against his neck and he shivers and his arms twitch.

“John,” my name hisses out in a whisper as I lick up the column of his throat.

“Yes?”

“I want--god…” He trails off as I bring my hands to his chest, running the silk of the tie over his nipples. He hisses a few breaths, then: “I want. I want to touch you. But.”

The muscles of his arms shiver and jump as I peel the shirt off his shoulders and chase the fall of the fabric with fingers and lips until it pools against the walls to which his hands might as well be glued.

I clench my eyes shut a moment to try to process what in hell is going on. He won’t take his hands away from the wall because I haven’t given him _permission_. I may die. Right here, leaning against my flatmate-turned-lover with the hardest hard-on maybe ever, I may die. If I do, the only thing I’ll be disappointed about is the fact that I wouldn’t have yet given him the reward I feel he very much deserves.

He rolls his hips against me and moans low, and I snap my eyes open. I hang onto the tie as I pull his hands away from the wall, backing towards the bed and stopping him as he surges forward, reaching for me.

It ranks among the hardest physical things I have ever done because I want nothing more than to feel those fingers on my skin but he wants this so badly and goddamn if I won’t give him everything I can.

“Wait,” I breathe, bending his arms back toward him before squeezing an implicit command for stillness before letting go. I remove one cufflink, then another, letting them fall to the floor before sliding this shirt sleeves over his hands and tossing the fabric to the side.

Slowly, giving him every chance in the world to stop me, I bring his hands forward, palms together, and wrap my tie around his wrist tight enough that it won’t slip past his palms but loose enough that he can still rotate his forearms slightly within their confines. I tie it off with a slipknot he can reach if he tries.  He stares at his arms and flexes his hands, then bites his lower lip, his fingers twitching towards me.

I release him and he leans into me with a sigh, pressing bound hands against my chest between us and resting his forehead on my shoulder. I card my fingers into his hair and nuzzle his neck.

“Undress me,” I murmur. “Touch me anywhere you want.” He turns his face toward my neck and makes a small sound. “But you have to...you have to tell me what you’re thinking.” I say on impulse and immediately wonder just how batshit insane I actually am.  

“Yes, John.” His murmured assent is almost muffled against the skin of my neck.

My legs threaten to buckle. I resist. He leans back to study me, and I expect the hyper intense scrutiny to which I’ve become accustomed, but it’s absent. His eyes are soft as they roam over me.  

He brings his hands up and awkwardly brushes my fringe back. His lips ghost over my forehead, not kissing, but drifting; another point from which to gain tactile data.  

“You are endlessly fascinating.” His breath puffs gently against my temple as his fingers work at the buttons of my shirt. I sigh. I’d been expecting to be picked apart physically. Trust Sherlock to look beyond what I asked for and get to what I want.  “You make me want things I’ve never previously considered. You make me want those things with an intensity usually reserved for my work.  You manage to surprise me on a daily basis. It’s incredible. You're incredible, John.”

Buttons dealt with, he leans back, brushing the fabric back from one shoulder then the other, and twists enough to toss the shirt behind him onto the bed. His eyes are hooded as he turns back to me, and they linger again at my scar.

“I never thought to be attracted to you.” he brings his hands up and drifts fingers across the nubby flesh on my shoulder. Even though I can’t feel that touch I shudder. “I’m not usually attracted to anyone. But--”

He breaks off,  biting his his lip as I sigh, unable to stay quiet as his fingers drift down my chest. He’s splayed those hands out as best he can, his fingers spidering over my stomach and he crowds close as he begins working at my belt, leaning over and tucking his face next to my neck,  blazing a trail of small kisses down to my shoulder.

“But one morning I found myself struggling not to pull you against me when you brought me tea,” he mutters, finally getting my belt open and focusing on the zip of my trousers. “And after that I-- God, John. _Jesus_ …”

I answer with a moan because he’s twisted his arms hard and fit both hands down my open trousers, under my pants, pushing them to my hips and cupping my hard, leaking cock with his palms. I shove my hips forward and he kneads both palms over me again and again, slicking my length with my own precome. I lean into him as he opens his mouth against my neck and laves my skin with his tongue in time to the rhythm he’s set working on my cock.

I have resisted touching him until now, but I can’t any longer. I bury my hand in his hair and pull him away from my neck, feeling my damp skin pucker in the cool air. He stares at me, and his eyes are just shy of focused. They drift shut as I place my other hand on his shoulder and push him gently downwards.

He slowly sinks to his knees and rocks back onto his heels, leaning his shoulders back against the bed.  Somewhat clumsily, he drags my trousers and pants down to my ankles. I make a concession and shift my weight from foot to foot, allowing him to remove them. Somehow, he manages to snag my socks at the same time.

“Genius,” I mutter, smiling at his answering smirk. I slide my fingers back into his soft curls and rub against his scalp softly, stepping towards him, bracketing his body between my legs. Sitting back on his heels, his perfect, pouting mouth is aligned with the tip of my prick. He’s staring at it and fucked if he isn’t actually licking his lips.

He leans forward and I shut my eyes in expectation of feeling hot, wet heat slide around me only to pop them back open as he slips his hands between my legs, sliding gentle fingers over my perineum before cupping my balls. He kisses up the crease of my groin and nuzzles against my hip, and his warm breath is all that touches my achingly hard cock. When I look down, he’s smirking up at me.

I grin and stroke my hand through his curls.

“This, I believe, is referred to as ‘topping from the bottom, Sherlock. Naughty boy.’” I can’t help but laugh, and it’s a joy to watch him follow the jostle of my cock with his eyes. I can feel his chuckle from where his chest presses against my leg.

“Conversation with you is such a crapshoot, John. I never know what is going to come out of that mouth of yours.” His lips curve into a smile as he alternates words with soft kisses along my hip. I hum in assent.

“Thing is, I can think of other things besides conversing that you can do with that wicked mouth,” I grip his hair with both hands and it’s like flipping a switch again. His eyes drop shut and he moans, relaxing beneath my hands.

His breath comes fast and I feel his fingers tremble as they continue their luxurious massage between my legs. The way his hands are tied puts him in a position of seemingly permanent supplication. It’s not what I initially intended, but it’s… god it’s unraveling my mind. I simply cannot believe how much he is getting off on this. I can’t believe how much _I_ am getting off on it.  I slide one hand around his jaw and brush my thumb over his lips before pressing inwards.

“Open,” My voice cracks but there’s definitely a command there, an order that snaps through him like a shock. His hands still and he parts those beautiful lips, tilting his head to chase my thumb with his tongue before I slide it between his teeth, hooking down to spread his jaws further. He sighs quietly when I withdraw my touch and take my cock in my hand, stroking slowly.

“God, Sherlock, you’re so...open your eyes. Look at me.”

Glasz irises are almost eclipsed by his pupils as he locks his eyes on mine, his tongue painting a suggestive swath over his lower lip. He makes a choked off sort of moan, his desire written in the upward angle of his eyebrows and the way he twitches towards me. I brush the tip of my cock across his lower lip and he groans, his eyes widening as I tug on his hair, holding him back, and I feel a stab of perverse excitement in denying him what he craves.  

I relax my hold, stroking through his hair gently. This time he doesn’t anticipate me as I brush over his lips again and, except for the occasional flick of his tongue, he remains still, staring up into my eyes as I trace the outline of his mouth. It’s feels a bit dangerous, how easily this unfathomable dynamic plays out between us, how intensely erotic his compliance is.

“Fuck, Sherlock. It’s perfect...this-- I’m going to fuck your mouth a bit all right? Just.. I can’t--” I step forward, pressing him back against the bed and cupping the back of his head gently in my hand as I sink my cock slowly into the wet heat of his mouth.

His groan of relief sends acutely pleasurable vibrations zinging around me as I start thrusting shallowly into him. He keeps his mouth wide open, his lips barely pressing around me as kneads my bollocks between his palms, pressing with just the right amount of pressure to tear a moan from my throat.

The very fact that he’s pinned so closely between my body and the bed, that I could bury my length down his throat if I wanted, is the only thing that keeps me from doing so. He quickly overcomes that particular subconscious nonsense, taking advantage of my momentary blissed-out inattention to rock himself forward, swallowing me deep while rubbing his thumbs firmly against my perineum.

“Jesus, Sherlock--”

My hips jerk forward reflexively and I groan, sliding fingers from his hair down his neck, lingering over his throat as he strains forward to take me deeper. He swallows around me and I lock my knees to keep from tumbling into him at the sharp spike of sweet sensation.

“Nope! Nope. Stop.” He stills immediately and it’s almost no good because he stops with my cock shoved half way down his throat and god damned if pulling out doesn’t almost take me over the edge. I pull anyway, grimacing at Sherlock’s indignant huff.

“Seriously? Sherlock, I swear to god, I usually have more stamina than your average teenager. But you...god. Just. Get up on the bed. I want to do things to you.” He chuckles as I pull him to his feet, sliding my hands over his chest before spinning him around and shoving. He lands gracelessly on his stomach, sprawled all over the mattress and his chuckle becomes a bark of laughter.

“John, I’d like to keep what’s left of my dignity if it’s all the same to you.”

“Says the man who was just on his knees gagging on my cock.” I smirk, diving after him and pressing up against him as he turns and rests on his side.

Our gasps mingle as we rut against each other and I slide my hands across his skin, stroking the long lines of his sides and his thighs before shoving my leg between his and pulling him even closer against my body. He lowers his arms over my head and pulls me against him as much as he can and our bodies slide on sweat-slick skin. I pull him into a slow, languid kiss that leaves us both breathless and slowly stroke down the long, strong column of his back, cupping and squeezing the perfect, plush mound of his arse.

“John,” Sherlock breathes, thrusting against my thigh. I drag fingertips over the swell of his arse and down his long thigh, snagging it up suddenly and rolling Sherlock onto his back, throwing my leg over him to  straddle his hips.

I duck out of the circle of his arms, pushing them up over his head and pressing them back into the mattress. He arches prettily, presenting me with a seductively bared throat and belly that make my mouth literally water.

Leaning over him, I roll my hips down and press our cocks together as I rake my nails down his chest. He hisses, his sultry-smug grin twisting into a rictus of desire as I lick over the reddened trails I’ve left in my wake.  His hips buck under me as I nip a line of small bruises from one nipple to the other. His breath is once again coming in short gasps. Each puff is a small, desperate sounding exclamation, and he’s so far gone he’s not even blushing.

I raise myself up on my knees and elbows and trap his head between my hands before shoving my mouth down onto his, riding his body as he twists below me with the force of tongue and teeth. By the time I’m done with this mouth his lips are red and swollen and he’s moaning.

“John...please. Please--” his hips jerk under mine, filling in the words that seem, for once, to have deserted him.

“Ask me, Sherlock. Tell me what you want,” I murmur into his ear before teasing the space right behind it with my tongue and teeth. When he doesn’t answer right away, I reach down between us and grasp our cocks together, giving both of us a few strokes. His breath hisses and he turns towards me and nuzzles my cheek with his, his lips brushing across my temple. Finally, vocabulary presents itself.

“I want. You in me. Please…”

I press my eyes shut for a moment and fight against the urge to ask if he’s sure. He’s probably been sure for a lot longer than me anyway.

“Lube?”

“Top drawer, god John, hurry.”

There is lube and, to my relief, condoms as well in the top drawer of his nightstand. I toss them by the pillow and eagerly turn my attention back to the thoroughly debauched man humping the air between my legs.

The great Sherlock Holmes, reduced to almost pure Id, a lithe, gangly pile of gorgeous, desperate sensation and, dare I think it, sentiment. And I made him that way. It’s a good day to be John freaking Watson.

Sherlock gazes at my face for a moment and soft expression sharpens a bit.

“Surveying your conquest?” he asks and though he’s smiling there’s a brittle edge to his voice that squeezes my heart.

“Oh, so very much yes,” I murmur, leaning down pressing my chest to his, bracketing his head with my elbows and laying a lingering kiss over his bruised lips.  “Can you really blame me, Sherlock? You’re beautiful. I mean you’re always beautiful, but right now, like you are...it’s incredible. It’s intoxicating, and the fact that it’s me you want is...I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that. I don’t think I’ll ever stop being grateful that you want me like this.”

His eyes are soft again and he cranes his neck up to reach my lips with his own. I settle over him to make it easier and we lay like that, pressed against each other and just sort of breathe each other in for a while. And that should, by all rights, sort of bank the fire a bit, but I’m beginning to realize that normal rules of engagement don’t apply when laying naked in bed with a bound consulting detective. Every stroke, every breath, seems to sharpen my need until I’m rolling my hips against his again, stroking his cock lightly and kissing gently across his chest.

“John!” he gasps, both sharp demand and desperate plea. I reach for the lube and coat my fingers liberally and hop off his lap. He starts to reach for me, but I stop him with a sharp look and turn to hitch his legs up till his knees are bent. I stretch out beside him and slip my fingers into the cleft of his arse and begin stroking slow circles around the firm, puckered circle of muscle. He moans and arches, his knees falling open as he flexes his arms back over his head.

I shift to kneel over him, kissing and licking my way down his body, finding that I simply can not get enough of the feel of his skin, sweat-slick and flushed. He’s relaxing into the rhythms I’ve set for him and starts thrusting back against my fingers. I lick my way down the flat plain of his stomach and swirl my tongue around the head of his cock as I breach him, slowly sliding my a finger into the heat of him as I slide his cock into my mouth. His strangled cry is music to me, and I work him slowly, sliding another finger into him and taking him deeper.

Slowly and methodically, I go about the glorious business of taking the man completely apart. In minutes, his body is quivering and shaking and every breath is devoted to a garbled litany of praise and want. He thrusts hard back onto my hand, and I crook my fingers up to catch his prostate. At that gossamer touch, his hips jerk off the bed and he slams his head back onto the mattress, his body arching as I thrust in again, enthralled by the intensity of his reactions.

“John! God _damn_ it. Please--” His words lose themselves in an abrupt shout as I bury my a third finger in him and keep my hand there, stroking that bundle of nerves with the pads of my fingers and relishing his utter loss of control. His penis is flushed, dark and leaking, straining against his stomach and it’s all I can do to keep from going down on him again--finishing him like this with my fingers and my mouth.

Sherlock tilts his leg, brushing his calf against my cock, and the brief contact makes me suddenly, excruciatingly aware of the aching hardness I’ve been neglecting. I feel lightheaded as I gently extract my fingers and fumble for the condom, finding myself the sudden focus of wide, pleading eyes that trace my movements as I roll it on and slick my cock with lube.

He spreads his thighs as I settle between them, realizing as I slide hands around his slim waist him that I’m shaking. He snugs his knees to my sides, pulling me closer without the use of his hands and a smile twitches over his lips.

“John, I appreciate your concern, but if you keep me waiting a moment longer, I swear I won’t be responsible for what happens to you.” His voice is fully an octave deeper than normal but strong and sure and I tension ebbs away from me, leaving me eager and excited.

Smiling, I draw him closer, hitching his arse up onto my lap and hooking my arms under his knees. I carefully position myself against him and slowly push the head of my cock against his anus. He sighs and tenses but I’ve prepared him so well there’s only a token resistance and I sheath myself in him in one slow thrust.

I’m unprepared for the intensity of it-- the tight, undulating heat of him is vastly different from anything felt before. I still completely, my breath coming in ragged gasps as I acclimate, reveling in the stretch and flutter of Sherlock’s body as he surrounds me in the most intimate way possible.

A few seconds or an eternity later, I feel him move against me, shifting closer, sending ripples of sensation through my body. I open my eyes and meet his gaze, delighting in the hint of a pleased smile hovering around his lips.

I thrust forward slowly and am rewarded by a deep, lush moan that alters in both frequency and volume as I pull almost completely out of him before plunging slowly back in. Sherlock braces his heels against the mattress and thrusts in counterpoint and, together we soon find a sublime rhythm, teasing out a perfect combination of speed and depth, drawing out every nuance of sensation. I lean over him, resting my forehead against his sternum and the heavy beat of his heart joins the song spinning out between us in near perfect syncopation.

He murmurs something, but the words are lost in thrumming vibration against my ear. It’s perfect, so perfect,  but I can feel the tremors shaking through him and am very much aware of the pressure building in my own body, and I know this can’t last much longer.

The thrum of his voice sounds again, shaping itself around my name and I slide my palms along his flexing thighs, smoothing over the dips between his ribs and the firm muscles of his chest before coming to rest on his biceps, and I push myself up and look at him, pressing his arms into the mattress.

He’s staring up at me from half hooded eyes, a dark flush blooming across his cheeks and down the pale column of his throat to spread across his shoulders. He tosses his head back a little further with every thrust, twisting his wrists in their silk wrappings and the sight of him, the vulnerable abandon so apparent in every twitch, every hitched breath, in the way he moans my name and the way he draws me deeper and closer, pushes me over the razor’s edge I have been walking.

Our perfect rhythm breaks, fracturing as I lose what tenuous control I had. I buck forward, slamming into him and he arches beneath me, his cries grown harsh and urgent as he tightens his entire body around me.

Amidst the bright nova of pleasure burning through me, I realize that he’s spilling between us and I have a moment of overwhelming gratitude that in this, as with everything, we are together before collapsing onto him and succumbing to momentary, sated oblivion.

The first thing I’m aware of is the feather light touch of fingers drifting through my hair, sending shafts of tingling sensation coursing through my body. The second thing I’m aware of is overwhelming, surrounding warmth.  Sherlock’s freed himself from my necktie and has wrapped me in a cocoon of arms and legs.

I want to tell him how amazing he is, how much I love him, how I can’t wait to do that to him again, and how very much I want him to return the favor but the only sound that escapes my lips is long, drawn out hum.

“Yes, quite.” Apparently, my hums are more articulate than I give them credit for. After a while, certain less than sexy feelings bubble to the forefront of my sluggish, sex addled brain, primary of which is the sticky slick of come spread between us that is slowly binding us together.

“Sticky,” I manage, and Sherlock’s chuckle rumbles against my ear.

“The unfortunate byproduct of a frankly incredible orgasm and totally worth the inconvenience in my opinion.”

“But you won’t fight me down if I decide to get a nice warm flannel to clean us up with, am I right?” There’s a minute contraction of limbs, and I think for a disconcerting second that flippancy at the moment might have been just a bit not good, when I am abruptly released from my warm prison.

“Tea wouldn't go amiss either, you know. Since you’ll already be up.” My laughter starts low, but eventually bubbles up until I’m basically vibrating with it. I push myself up onto my elbow and look down at Sherlock who looks back, a lazy smile playing across his face as he stretches.

“You look utterly debauched, you ridiculous creature.” He cocks an eyebrow at me and cuffs a fingers through his hair, inducing it into an even more riotous mess of curls.

“It must look good on me, given your reaction.” I snort and stuff my arms into one of his dressing gowns.

“Everything looks good on you, you utter bastard.”

An hour later, the room is quiet and dark and Sherlock, against all odds, is pressed against my back, curled around me, deeply asleep. I reach for my phone and thumb it on, tapping out a quick message to my wife who will be speeding back to London in a matter of hours.

_Mary, you are in for one hell of a ride. I can’t wait till you get home. Love you._

I click send and make sure the sound is off before placing it back on the nightstand and wiggle further back into the concave arc of Sherlock’s body. My last thought before sleep claims me is how wonderful it will be to have Mary tucked against me as I’m tucked against him.

 

 


	40. Chapter 40

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock notes!

File: Voltaire

Status: Password Protected

Case Notes:

The theory that I am wholly in love* with John Watson can now be considered proven. Though there was never much doubt, our interactions, both sexual and non-sexual, over the past three days are validation beyond reproof of the strength and solidity of our bond.

As I write this, John and Mary are ensconced in their room. I dismissed his suggestions that I could join them, though it was unreasonably difficult to deny myself of that pleasure. Mary gave me John for several days, gave us the gift of time and solitude.

I have much for which to thank her, but allowing John and I the space and time needed to come to this point surpasses everything else. Of the many things I revealed during the course of the speech at their wedding, the fact that this woman is eminently worthy of John’s love and devotion is perhaps the most true.

I will put forth all my effort in order to prove as worthy of her but until that comes to pass the very least I can do is give them time alone to reaffirm...whatever it is that needs to be reaffirmed.

Though sentiment is not my area, I am a scholar of human reactions and, amidst the effusive greetings and general hubbub of homecoming, I caught a twitch of envy from Mary as John told her about our case and our date and alluded to some of the more intimate elements of our time together. She masked it quickly, but I have seen how quickly aftermath when that tiny spark of such sentiment can ignite a conflagration of pain.

It is not only to stave off disaster that I wish to find equal footing with her. Having been through the process of falling in love with John, I recognize much in her that would surely engender the same response given enough time. No one has ever accused me of moderation.  I have tasted the unexpected delights of loving.  I want more-- so much more. Everything in fact. From them both.

Conclusion: I must find a way to accelerate my relationship with Mary.

Since I have only one successful example from which to extrapolate data, I will analyze the progression of my relationship with John as objectively as I can and attempt to formulate a plan to replicate that success.

The moment I saw John he interested me-- to a certain extent. There was something about the dichotomy of a soldier-doctor that appealed to me immediately and it seemed as though his unique skillset would make him a valuable ally as well as a flatmate who would not reject many of my idiosyncrasies out of hand. It seemed like a mutually beneficial relationship. And then he shot the cabbie.

It was not until I asked after his mental well being after the fact that I realized how different he was. I never ask about anyone’s mental well being, regardless of what actions they had taken on my behalf, (Lestrade can personally attest to this) and yet the gesture was as natural towards John as requesting his company at dinner had been moments later.

Over the course of the following months, I half noticed a variety of changes in my typical reactions where he was concerned, but it was not until the “Great Game” was afoot that I realized how extremely my perceptions of him had altered. His disappointment in my apparent apathy towards Moriarty’s victims bothered me far more than I thought someone else’s opinion ever could.  

However, it was when he came into view at the pool that I understood completely just how much he meant to me. Before I realized that he was Moriarty’s puppet, I had one moment of absolute certainty that I had been betrayed. I have never felt more in my life, not as a child, not ever. The sense of disbelief and betrayal and ultimately of utter despair were things I understood later. At the time, I thought my heart would simply burst. Which it nearly did when I realized what was actually happening.

He offered himself in my place. No one had ever even bothered offering to buy me dinner before him, and he offered his life for mine. The thought still sends chills through me. I realized then that I would die for him.

The day I did, hearing his voice from the rooftop-- the desperation and the fear in it-- was the ultimate tipping point for me. That was when I realized that I would not only die for him but live for him-- that I could endure temporary absence with the promise of permanence after. In that terrifying moment of revelation, he became more for me than my brother in arms, more than the family I had chosen for myself.

Finding him involved with Mary upon my homecoming brought to light another undiscovered facet of myself: self sacrifice.

One of the detriments of being able to ferret out the truth of almost any situation is the fact that I am not immune to my own regard. I am necessarily realistic about my abilities and my limitations, physical, mental and emotional. Never did I think myself capable of putting my own happiness or needs aside for the needs of another, and yet John once again proved the exception to my rules.

All of my actions in my absence had been geared toward enabling myself to return and reclaiming John and yet I was almost immediately prepared to accept Mary for his sake. Indeed, I would have been able to do so even had she not miraculously spared me that act of self sacrifice, and without any thought for recompense. The culmination of all of this burst forth in the dramatic turmoil of our emotions after the wedding and the revelation of Mary’s pregnancy.

Upon review, it appears as though the strength of my bond with John has been tempered in a forge of pain and heartache. Though it seems counter intuitive to wish misfortune and angst on myself and Mary, all proof points to this necessity. It is also likely that prolonged absence was a factor in the evolution of John’s feelings for me. What is the idiom? Distance makes the heart grow fonder?** It is possible that I have to find a way to distance myself from them in order to increase my bond with Mary.

Fortunately*** calamity and danger dog all of our heels and it seems as though it will be only a matter of time before misfortune once again rears its head and makes our lives unbearably interesting for a while so it is unlikely I will have to manufacture any.  Hopefully the result will be sufficient to make the initial pain worthwhile. Even if it is not, I will do what is necessary to protect them both, no matter the cost. Until such time as calamity presents itself, I will initiate more common courting strategies.

*Love- I confess an utter inability to define it due to a lack of quantifiable units of measurement. It transcends the quantifiable. Beautifully.

**Who is responsible for this trash? It is the mind, not the heart which controls and reacts to matters of sentiment.

***For the record I don’t believe in fortune or chance, but if I did, the fact that I am in a position to consider calamity fortunate speaks loudly about my life choices.


	41. Chapter 41

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock gets some friendly advice.

“Sherlock.”

“Yes, John?”

“I’m jealous. I’m man enough to admit it.”

“There is no need for jealousy. Mary is currently unable to accompany me on cases as you can. This is--”

“ _Kidding_ , Sherlock. Really, I am. I love it that you’ve been doing things together, though it does seem like you’re trying to fit four years worth of dates into as many weeks. Not that I’m complaining! Besides I have a ‘date’ with Lestrade and a few blokes to watch the match.”

“Thank god Mary and I will both be spared that spectacle.”

“Oh, it will be a spectacle. In fact, I expect we’ll be out quite late. The pub’s by Greg’s place. If I get legless, I might just crash there, so don’t worry Moriarty’s got me if I don’t make it home.”

“...That joke was in incredibly poor taste, John.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake. It’s not as if he’s fucking Voldemort. Besides, that nasty little shitstain is rotting underground now thanks to you, you brilliant man.”

“Firstly, I don’t have any idea who Voldemort is. Secondly, you tend to swear more when you’re gearing up to go ‘out with the lads’ which I find unexpectedly endearing and thirdly, even if you don’t return tonight, as you’ve often done before, I will not be taking Mary to bed with me, which you apparently hoped I would consider doing in your absence or you wouldn’t have mentioned it.”

“For crying out loud, why not? You can’t actually think I don’t realize how much you want to? Every time you _look_ at her you fuck her with your eyes, and if _that_ wasn’t hot enough, she’s been doing the same to you! What on earth are you waiting for?”

“Ugh, I don’t _know_! John, we had years of...history behind us before...this. It was--easier, in many ways, for me to understand--”

“Sherlock, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean...It’s just that you may be overthinking this just a bit. I’m not suggesting that you should rush into things at all, obviously, if you’re uncomfortable--”

“It’s not _my_ discomfort I’m concerned about. I’m not uncomfortable. Perhaps a bit...frustrated.”

“Ah. Sherlock. Deduce how many dates I went on with Mary before we ended up sleeping together.”

“Given your history and the frequency with which--”

“Spare me the, uh, process this time if you don’t mind.”

“Seven dates.”

“Nope. Twice. Two dates.”

“But she’s not--”

“Easy? Definitely not. But she’s a woman who knows exactly what she wants. Sometimes it’s just right. Mary was right for me, and I was right for her, and there is no fucking reason to wait when everyone wants the same thing.”

“And you think…”

“I don't think. I _know_. Heard it straight from the horse’s mouth.”

“Mary’s mouth is in no way equine!”

“It’s a saying Sherlock. An idiom. Besides, she’s my wife. I can make fun of her if I want.”

“Well, she certainly gives back as good as she gets.”

“Sherlock? Honestly? You have _no idea_.”


	42. Chapter 42

I lean back into the deep cushions of my seat, splaying my hands over my belly. For once, the gesture has nothing whatsoever to do with my pregnancy and everything to do with the fact that I have just stuffed myself to the point of immobility.  
  
Thank God for this bloody dress. I smooth hands over the silk, smiling to myself. It’s cut to draw one’s attention from an expanding waistline and divert it to one’s other...assets. It cost an arm and a leg and it was worth every single Euro just for the frankly ravenous look on John’s face as I dressed and Sherlock’s instant flush when I met him in the sitting room. I love watching the flush spread over that pale, perfect skin. I catch myself wondering how far down that flush spreads and how many different ways I could tease it to the surface and push the thought aside with a slow blink.  
  
“It’s official, Sherlock. I’m spoilt. I am. You’ve ruined my appetite for any food other than that which comes from this place. You sodding bastard.”  
  
His lips tilt up into that small, mischievous smile that I always thought was just for John, his dimples catching the flickering shadows from the candle burning between us. It’s a long, rustic taper in a wrought iron, lethal looking candle stick that fits in perfectly with the ancient wine cellar/Elizabethan tavern thing this place has going for it.  
  
“I wasn’t sure you’d like it. John certainly wouldn't have.” There’s a hint of wistfulness there, and I wonder how often Sherlock’s come here alone. Or for that matter felt like it but abstained. No matter how much a high functioning sociopath you are, eating alone is rubbish, especially in a cozy ambiance like this.  
  
“Oh, please. The most adventurous thing John’s ever eaten is haggis, and I’m fairly sure he’s got some genetic predisposition to that stuff anyway. This was perfect. Sweetbreads. Who knew?”  
  
“Clancy knows. He’s England’s foremost authority on the selection and preparation of offal. This evening’s seating is by invitation only.”  
  
“Let me guess… you got him off a murder charge? Perhaps you helped him prove some other guy did the embezzling? Figured out who was blackmailing his brother maybe?” Sherlock’s eyes crinkle as his lips twist fascinatingly from smile to smirk. I could watch those damn lips. All. Day. Long.  
  
“I happen to have met Clancy entirely by chance. We both frequented the same butcher before I had access to Bart’s, though I dare say the uses to which we put the scraps could not be more disparate.”  
  
I grimace, well able to imagine what Sherlock could get up to with a bull’s heart. That awful image dissolves quickly as I watch an absolute vision of ginger hair and high collared black jacket pad up behind Sherlock, a wry grin twisting his lips as he catches my eye and winks. Sherlock hasn’t noticed. He’s been gratifyingly distracted all evening.  
  
“Ah. I have this incredible mental image of two gorgeous men fighting like mongrels over a calf’s liver,” I say, just loud enough for the man to hear me. His smile twitches wider.  
  
“How do you know he’s attractive?” Sherlock asks, a winglike brow flying for his hairline. And isn’t _that_ turn of phrase telling.  
  
“Because unless I miss my guess, he’s standing right behind you. If you weren’t staring so intently at my lips you might have noticed.”  
  
Sherlock’s eyes go wide just as the man claps a hand on his shoulder, pulling him half around.  
  
“Don’t worry, Sherlock, I won’t hold it against you. Were I the one seated across from lips as luscious as those, you’d be able to sneak the whole Household Cavalry up behind me and I’d be none the wiser.” Clancy leers good naturedly at me and winks again, and I have to laugh.  
  
Sherlock rolls his eyes even as he reaches for the man’s proffered hand, shaking it firmly.  
  
“Mary, meet Clancy, whose manners are apparently as rare as the meat he cooks.”  
  
“Since when is complimenting a lady not good manners? Besides, she started it. Called me gorgeous. I heard it.”  
  
“He’s got me there, Sherlock. Dinner was absolutely delicious, though I may not want to know the names of every organ I ate.”  
  
Clancy nods vigourously. “Ignorance is bliss, yeah? I’m surprised this one didn’t see fit to enlighten you at the least opportune moment.”  
  
“Sherlock? No, he can be tactful when the mood suits him.”  
  
“News to me. Must be your good influence, darlin’. Though, I never figured you as one for the ladies, Sherlock! Color me surprised. Anyway, sit back and enjoy the music, they’ll be done setting up here any moment. Enjoy your evening, you two!”    
  
I wonder if my parting smile is as twisted as my guts feel. Not one for the ladies, huh? I glance at Sherlock’s face and his expression is not one I’d call encouraging.  He’s scowling determinately down at the drinks menu.  
  
“Clancy has an even poorer filter than I do, apparently,” he mutters eventually, folding the menu and rubbing his jaw with his fingers. He still hasn’t met my eyes, and I wonder if that’s it. Maybe it was his time with John that...cemented his sexuality somehow. I can’t bring myself to completely believe that though, not after having caught him basically eye fucking me multiple times over the past few weeks. He couldn’t mix his messages more if he had a fucking blender.  
  
I resist the urge to scrub at my eyes. I didn’t spend all this time applying makeup just to scrub it off, but I want to scream in frustration. I have no idea... _no idea_ what to expect anymore. As Sherlock is so fond of saying, I need more data.  
  
“Sometimes that kind of honesty is quite refreshing,” I say, sipping my water for something to do. The half a glass of wine I had earlier seems to have happened in another life.  “Even... illuminating,” I finish. His brows knit, and he scowls faintly.  
  
“Explain?”  
  
Christ. Tact is about as useful as a glass hammer when dealing with him.  I _need_ to know. I find myself plucking nervously at my napkin and I wonder if John ever finds himself feeling like an idiot teenager in the face of this man. I imagine he does.  
  
“Well, look at it this way. We’ve been, uh, dating? Sure. Why not call it that? We’ve been dating for weeks now and this is as close as we’ve been to each other barring the occasional brush round the flat, and that’s because this table couldn't be any smaller if it tried, and our legs are basically intertwined. I was starting to think that you had just changed your mind...but it makes much more sense now. And it’s fine, really it is--”  
  
Sherlock winces and his scowl darkens. I want to reach across and smooth the lines from his face, to just, I don’t know. Take it back and continue the way we were. But it’s too late now and I experience momentary dizziness as I realize how swiftly our pleasant evening is spiraling into absolute disaster.  
  
“You’re referring to Clancy’s implication that I’m gay.” Sherlock narrows his eyes at me. “How, exactly, would that be _fine_ considering our...arrangement?” He bites out quietly.  
  
I flail around for a response that won’t be demanding or pathetic.  
  
“We’d make it fine, Sherlock. It...You don’t need to-- You and me, we can be... friends. You and John can still--” I stop talking because it hurts too much. I’d do it, sure I would, but I can’t seem to say it. Sherlock’s face is a mask of incredulity.  
  
“You can’t possibly think that will actually work, Mary,” he says softly.  
  
I shake my head miserably, my heart pounding, adrenaline surging as I realize that I might have inadvertently just ruined _everything_. I need time. I need to talk to John and figure out where I went wrong...I wish he was here. I wish he was here.  
  
“Sherlock,” Christ I’m a fucking assassin. I have shoved knives into larynxs with less trouble than I’m having here. “Look, I’m sorry. Just don’t--”  
  
He hisses and lurches to his feet and, for one nauseating moment, I think he’s going to walk out and leave me here, but he hooks his ankle around the leg of his chair and spins it around to my side of the table and reseats himself next to me.    
  
I startle as a drum solo starts off the band that I hadn’t even noticed setting up at the other end of the restaurant from our little nook. Sherlock drapes his arm over the back of his chair, his fingertips brushing my shoulder as he leans into my space. Some kind of jazz ensemble? The soft, mellow music that issues forth does nothing to calm me.  
  
“Mary.”  
  
I don’t think I imagine the waver in his voice. He slides his fingers over my shoulder, cupping it lightly and lays his hand over mine in my lap. There’s definitely a tremor there. Faint, but definitely there. Perversely, his discomfort comforts me, and I raise my eyes to his. He blinks slowly and looks away, down at our hands.  
  
“Mary, when I was nine, they put my dog down. He was an Irish Setter called Redbeard because I’d always wanted to become a pirate. My parents and Mycroft told me that he ran away, but even at that age, they couldn’t fool me. He was the only friend I had, the only creature in the world that did not judge me or attempt to fix me in some way or other. It broke my heart.”  
  
His voice is shaking, and I have no idea what’s going on or what I’m supposed to do with this totally depressing non sequitur. I can envision a curly-haired, tear-stained little boy wondering why he was being lied to, so I take the hand resting in my lap in mine and stroke my thumb over his knuckles.  
  
“I’m sorry, Sherlock, that’s horrible. They should never have tried to lie to you, even at that age.”  
  
“They thought they were _protecting_ me,” he murmurs, his fingers flexing in mine.  
  
“I’m sure. Sherlock? Why are you telling me this?” He lifts his eyes and searches my face. I have no idea what he finds there that makes him sigh.  
  
“I’m telling you because it’s something about me that John doesn’t know. He’s always wondered about the reference, but I’ve never told him. I rarely talk to him about my life before we met.”  
  
“Then why are you telling me?”  
  
“I-- Because there isn’t enough time.”  
  
I feel like a fish, flopping around out of water. I have no fucking clue what the hell is going on in that brain. I _really_ wish John was here to translate.  
  
“Enough time for what?” I ask softly, hoping it won’t shut him down. His mouth works for a moment and catching Sherlock trying to put words together is a rather shocking thing to begin with.  
  
“John and I were flatmates and friends for years before we formed a romantic attachment. With you, it’s quite different. I’m trying to build with you what I have with him. You deserve no less. So, I thought I’d give you something he doesn’t have. Molly said--”  
  
I abruptly remember my hen night conversation with Molly, and everything...almost everything...snaps suddenly and perfectly into place. Of course she’d have talked to Sherlock about it. He’s been trying to..I don’t know. He’s been being so bloody Sherlock about this. Considering what I thought was happening, it’s such a bloody relief. I can’t help it, I start laughing.  
  
He jerks his hand away. Well, he tries to, but I’ve dug in nicely and he gets positively nowhere, so he settles for scowling at me.  
  
“Sherlock, you can be the single sweetest and most idiotic man in the entire world, and you can do it at the exact same time. You’re incredible.”  
  
“I am an _idiot_ because I wanted you to convince you of your importance?” he hisses. “Because I didn’t want to rush you into a sexual relationship? I thought that was referred to as being a gentleman.”  
  
He tugs at his hand again, but I hang on and squeeze his fingers till he stops.  
  
“Honestly Sherlock? I did feel like the third wheel for a bit. But you’ve-- God, you’ve been so… amazing. You’ve accepted me and included me in every aspect of your life, and if I haven’t told you how much I appreciate that...God, I apologize.”  
  
He’s paying attention at a level usually reserved for the crime scenes and staring at me as though I actually am one. I brush my fingers against his cheek and I’m rewarded by a subtle softening, a minor inclination towards my touch that means I might not actually be about to cock this whole thing up.  
  
“No, Sherlock, you’re an idiot because you think you’re rushing me at all, despite the fact that I’ve been doing everything I can think of to attract you short of clubbing you over the head and dragging you to my bed by those gorgeous curls of yours. I thought...maybe you didn’t want me. Like...that. That things had changed since you and John...”  
  
“What?” Sherlock gasps softly, his eyes widening in denial. He starts to shake his head, but stops and sort of jerks forward instead, bringing our mouths together hard. The fact that it is the single most awkward attempt at a kiss I’ve ever experienced doesn’t seem to matter. A burst of warmth, relief and joy turns my joints to jelly and I lean into him. It takes a second, but his lips soften against mine and his hands, when they slide up to frame my face, are warm and steady.  
  
What was awkward a second ago becomes perfect and then more than perfect as our lips move softly together. He pulls away with a quiet sigh still clasping gently at the nape of my neck like he’s worried I’m going do a runner. Heh. He’s lucky we’re still seated in our chairs and fully clothed. I wonder if he knows that.  
  
“I am impossibly bad at this,” he mutters.  “Please believe I never meant to give you the impression that I didn’t want you. It’s true that I’m usually attracted to members of my own gender, but you have proven to be an amazingly distracting exception. You must understand that my feelings for you go far beyond any sense of _obligation_.”  
  
He says the word like an expletive, scowling around it.  
  
I grin up at him, stroking the backs of my fingers along his cheek. This time, he leans obviously into the touch, half closing his eyes as I stroke back into his hair. I tug him down and he leans over my shoulder until my lips are next to his ear.  
  
“I can think of a few ways you can prove it to me, Sherlock,” I murmur. His chuckle is warm and deep and he turns his head towards me, brushing his lips against my neck.  
  
“Oh?” The humid puff of his breath in my ear makes me shiver, and he draws me closer to him. “Will you enlighten me, Mary? John has informed me that you are a woman who knows precisely what she wants. Tell me what you like.”  
  
God. Damn. We are so lucky that we’re sitting in the back corner of a music filled restaurant. The moan that escapes my lips would otherwise have attracted some unwanted attention.  
  
“You’re doing a pretty good job deducing it,” I say breathlessly as he lays a soft kiss on my neck.  
  
“Mmm, I’d rather hear it from your lips, Mary.” My breath catches. His voice has dipped even deeper. How is that even _possible_? He begins to gently knead the nape of my neck, and his lips find this spot just under where my earring lays against my throat that I never realized was an erogenous zone. Learn something new every day.  
  
“John. Mmm. John says you purr. D’you purr? I think, ah, I think I want to make you do that.” I trace my fingertips up the length of his thigh and he twitches, his muscles jumping. He tenses then and draws away from me.  
  
“Waiter,” he quietly explains and he scoots himself closer to the table.  
  
“Can I interest you in an digestif or dessert while you enjoy the music?” The waiter asks, smoothy averting his eyes as Sherlock struggles to regain some composure. It delights me far, far more than it should that a bit of flailing is necessary.  
  
“No, thanks,” I say quickly. Sherlock cocks an eyebrow at me, and his lips lift into a teasing grin. They’re darker, rosier than normal and that’s just lovely.  
  
“I’ll just bring you the check then.”  
  
“No need. Here. Thank you.” Sherlock produces a card from mid air. Our waiter takes it with a little bow and walks quickly over to the cashier station.  
  
“Sorry to usurp your prerogative, but there is absolutely nothing left on _this_ menu that I want to indulge in,” I say, and his grin twitches wider under hooded eyes as he slips an arm around my shoulders stroking small circles over my arm.  
  
“Indeed. Well, if truth be told jazz was never my favorite. I think my mood is tending to something more vocal than instrumental.” His voice is like liquid smoke, curling around us.  
  
“Ah. That’s...good. Very good. What time is it? If we hurry, we can catch the tail end of evening vespers at Westminster Abbey.” I smirk and that earns me a full-on laugh.  
  
“Neither the theme nor the venue suit my mood. Try again,” he says easily, signing for the bill and pocketing his card. I don’t quite jump out of my chair, though it’s a near thing. Sherlock chuckles again and lays his hand lightly on the small of my back, guiding us through the labyrinth of tables to the cloakroom.  
  
“So, not a church and a boy’s choir then. There’s always the opera. I bet Mycroft could get us in at the interval.”  
  
“It’s the Magic Flute this week. I don’t think I can take an hour of pointless embellishment and overused coloratura. No, I think something more...organic is more to my taste at the moment.”  
  
I almost snatch my wrap from the attendant, and only Sherlock’s hand on my waist keeps me from bolting towards the door. We make our way with dignity and aplomb out into the cool October air and pause on the sidewalk as the doorman goes to wave down a cab.  
  
He takes my wrap from my hands and swirls it around my shoulders, smoothing it across my chest in a chaste gesture that absolutely should not weaken my knees like it does. He cyclones himself into his Belstaff and turns back to me, reaching out and pulling me toward him, tucking me against him between the lapel of his coat. It’s clammy and damp, and he’s delightfully warm as he wraps his arms around me.  
  
“You’re cold.”  
  
“Nope.”  
  
“You’re not cold, and yet you’re shivering. What can we deduce from that?” He pulls me closer, pressing me against his chest and does John’s chin tuck thing, staring down at me. His face is shadowed, backlit by lamplight that turns the tips of his curls golden.  
  
“Well, my neck is a little chilly,” I murmur. Instantly gloved hands slide up my back and cup my exposed throat.  
  
“And, you know, my nose. It may be somewhat numb,” I say, and a chuckle smokes out into the night. His fingers are so long, he doesn’t have to move his hand to brush a thumb over the tip of my nose.  
  
“Yeah. Better, ta. Thing is, my lips--”  
  
I don’t even get a chance to finish that one before he tilts his face down and covers my lips with his, and there’s no hesitation or any semblance of chastity now as his lips part and he licks into my mouth with bold, sure strokes.  
  
The world shrinks down to the circumference of the circle of light we stand in. I’m not sure how long we stay locked together, but I’m pretty sure the discrete cough that sounds behind us was not the first one. It’s not really discreet either. Discreet probably didn’t work. The doorman sounds like he’s hacking up his bloody lungs. He’s holding a cab door open and very deliberately looking at the ground. We pull away from each other, all breathless smiles and insincere apologies and bundle ourselves in.  
  
I don’t make it halfway across the seat before Sherlock catches me around the waist with one arm, snugging me back against him as the cab door slams and he gives the cabbie our address.  
  
“We never did settle on your music preference, Sherlock.” I let my eyes drift shut as his fingertips dip under the fabric of my wrap, ghosting back and forth across my collar bone. My breathy sigh might contain just the slightest hint of a moan.  
  
“That’ll do nicely, though we’ll need to work on your range,” he growls. I send a silent prayer out into the world that Mrs. Hudson has found somewhere else to be this evening. I doubt anyone but Sherlock and John would be interested the serenade we’re about to sing. It’s the last thought I have before his mouth descends on mine, and I gladly relinquish thoughts altogether.


	43. Chapter 43

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are many ways to achieve intimacy. Fortunately for Sherlock, some are more pleasurable than others.

“I can see the height difference is becoming a problem. Try sliding her onto your lap, the angle will be better and she won’t have to crane her neck quite as hard. You’re a tall drink of water, I’ll give you that.”

Nothing about these words-- their origin, their intent, the fact that they cause Mary’s lips stop moving against mine, makes any sense. It makes so little sense that I ignore it in favor of licking at Mary's lips, trying to regain lost access.

“Or, you could prop yourself up against the door, give him a bit of leverage, if you follow me.”

Mary’s shaking now. Struggling, I think, not to burst into laughter. Tremors rip through my body as well, but it is not hilarity that I’m containing but certain extreme homicidal tendencies which I have not felt in some time ( _bit not good, don’t care_.) Rage and lust are apparently closely related emotions and one quickly supplants the others as the god damn cabbie actually _keeps talking_.

“Oh, by all means carry on, then,” the cabbie smirks into the rear view mirror, remorselessly meeting my glare. “I’m not even here.”

There are many things I don’t understand about the woman tucked against my chest. Why she isn’t coldly murdering this interloper is one of them. Surely she’s killed better people for less? Instead she’s...Well it isn’t really laughing, in the strictest sense of the word is it?  It should not be possible to look so beautiful and sound like the spawn of a pig and donkey, but she manages. Actually, it’s quite impressive, objectively speaking. Subjectively, I want to make it stop as soon as possible because the fire-in-my-veins feeling is fading and it was so very good and all I want is for it to come back. Homicide will only delay us, so I settle for something less cathartic but infinitely more legal.

“You,” I growl, kicking the back of the cabby’s seat, “will not be receiving a tip.”

“Sherlock!” Mary stops braying. I brace for impact. This….This is where things derail. This is where John would glare, and roll his eyes and beg a great something for patience and it dies, it all dies and I should have kept still _why can I never keep still_?

“After all the good advice she gave us, she deserves _something_.”

Six heartbeats. That’s how long it takes me to recognize the utter difference between Mary Watson and John Watson.  There’s something decidedly wicked in the set of her lips and the angle of her shoulders and my breath catches in my throat. 

_A show_. Her flushed lips silently felate the words, wrapping around them lovingly and the fire, god the fire, the flames, they engulf me and I’ll twist here forever and that’s fine.

“Lap or door?” I murmur in her ear, not trusting my voice because my voice will crack like a burning stick.

“Is that really an ‘either/or’ kind of a question Sherlock?”

_Fuck_.

I reach over and pull her to me, sliding her sideways onto my lap. She leans back against the door and I twist towards her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. She melts against me, pliant and hot and I wonder, can I burn her? Will my fingers sear her skin where I touch her? Logically, this shouldn't be a concern, but I feel as though I’ll burn through my clothes and her clothes and the seat as she molds her body against mine, fitting against me like air and skin and _how_ is she doing this?

She buries her fingers in my hair and moans lavishly as I cover her mouth with mine, a sound that somehow bypasses auditory perception directly affects the state of my erection and I want to slow down and figure out which wires crossed in my brain to allow that to happen but I can’t spare a neuron at the moment, they’re all engaged in feeling her body. 

“Now wait a minute!”

The cabbie has the gall to sound peeved, even though we are but following her explicit instructions. I’d say something about her junkie son or her absentee husband at this point, but I can’t be bothered, not when Mary’s tongue is raking across my lips and maybe it is I who should be worried about immolation.

I make my lips soft, like that one thing John did, I observed and learned and I hope I can make her make that sound I made when he….there it is, a centimeter maybe two between jaw and ear. Maybe tongue? Maybe...teeth? Lightly, just slightly right _there_.

She shivers and moans again and cants her silk-clad hips downwards, and that’s what they call a result, and these little lights? What are they..little lights off to the sides of my vision?

Can the friction of a lovely silk-clad, bottom against a turgid cock actually cause visual hallucinations? Why the hell does anyone do drugs and not just bite this little scrap of silken skin twixt jaw and ear and reap the benefits of that?

She’s doing it again, the little, _god_ , the little-- wiggle, the moan and the thrust. Is it because I moaned? Or because I thrust up against her? Ah, both thrust and moan, but I’m fairly sure either reaction in isolation would garner the same results and we could continue this beautiful feedback loop until the end of time. Except we can’t because once again, the cabbie from hell has cocked it up, slamming to a halt. If it wasn’t in front our flat, I’d kill her now, I would. ( _Bit not good, don’t care._ )

“Out!” The cabbie says, perfunctory. I worry for a moment that my eyes might actually roll out of their sockets as I toss a handful of money over the seat back.

There’s a flutter of silk as Mary rises from my lap and the loss of her, the loss of her heat and weight and friction drive me from the cab with no more thought for money or that insufferable bitch behind the wheel. She’s like  a magnet, like surface tension, like static electricity. Being apart is just...I can’t. I reach and pull and pull and clasp and she bends and presses and laughs.

“Show like that, she should have tipped us!” Mary gasps out. “You should have moaned more! Your voice can kill people.”

Note to self about my voice. I have tailored my appearance to attract, but apparently, if John and Mary’s reactions are typical, I have been vastly under-cultivating one of my most useful assets. No time like the present...I pitch it low, chest deep, dark. 

“John’s the one who kills the cabbies,” I remind her, privately delighting in her giggle and gasp as I open the door, urging her in before me.

“Oh yes, we must keep the division of labour clear,” she laughs, spinning into the hall and catching my hand to pull be in after her. She removes my glove, but I’m close regardless, distance is inconceivably disgusting and again, I’m shocked at the quality of my affection for her...the strength of the attraction.

She shines here in the dim hallway, and I can’t help reaching forward and brushing my fingertips along the line of her brow and over her hair, the gossamer strands soft and supple under my fingers. She tilts her head into my touch and allows her eyes to drift shut as I stroke.  

“How do you _do_ this?”

Do this? Do what? I’m not even aware of the question till it’s already out there hanging between us. I don’t know what I mean. 

“Do what?”

Her eyes pop open as I pull her close again.  I want to crush her and push her inside me and gently stroke every inch of her skin and feather my lips over her stomach and breasts, and my arms lock up as I fight this vicious internal battle between violence and tenderness. 

“You’re the most lethal thing in this place,” I groan, pressing my cheek into the softness of her curls, my fingers fisting hard into the wool of her wrap. “and yet you... engender this...this… what the hell _is_ this, Mary? I want someone to try to hurt you so I can kill them for you, do you understand?  How is it possible to want to tuck you inside me so no one can ever touch you and simultaneously want to throw you hard against a wall and fuck you until you scream?”

“Christ, _Sherlock_ ,” she breathes and pulls me down to her, crushing our mouths together and biting my bottom lip hard. My eyes slam shut of their own volition and I curve around her body, bending mine to fit into all the gaps. Her wrap ends up on the stairs as we twist together. She pulls away and stares at me with half hooded eyes darkened by arousal. 

“So this is Sherlockian foreplay,” her voice is dark and heavy, sliding like oil on silk, and I smirk, pressing her against the wall by the stairs and pinning her there with my hands and my hips. She moans as I press my erection against her abdomen and lets her head fall back against the wall exposing her throat which is far too inviting.

Without consciously willing it, I find my lips ghosting over the soft flesh below her jaw, but the angle’s wrong. I have to lean down and that puts a truly egregious amount of space between the rest of our bodies.

“We need to be horizontal for this to work, you beautiful but ridiculously small woman. I could fit you in my pocket.”

I try for subsonic this time, pressing my chest against her and feeling the vibrations of my own voice echoed back. She stills against me and moans, then grins glowing and happy and excited and God, _God_ I can’t even process her.

Bubbling laughter erupts from her and her breasts press against my chest as she loops her arms around my neck.

“Take me to bed, Sherlock.”

Is she experimenting with her voice too? Brilliant woman, I wouldn’t put it past her. I wonder how many clues I give that that exact concoction of breathy, and needy and demanding has an illogically potent effect on me and it’s becomes the most natural thing in the world to gather her body into my arms and sweep her up the stairs.

I think about carrying us all the way up to their eire on the third floor and the idea of penetrating her while surrounded in the complex scent of them both nearly makes me stumble, but there is time for that, there will be time for all of us. Right now--

My room is dark except for a shaft of street light that pierces through a gap in my curtain, cutting a bright slash across my bed. I lay her down in the light, and lower myself to my knees by the bed, and observe.

Her legs shift as she toes off her heels, and layers of thin silk cascade into the shadowed hollows of her body. I want to dip my fingers into the dark depth between her thighs and between her lips and it makes my body shake. Her eyes glitter in the shadow of her cheekbones as she watches me and she stretches, arching her back slightly against the sheets before tucking her arms over her head, stretching herself out on display.

It is impossible not to touch her, though I fight the compulsion as long as I can so that I can continue watching the subtle rise and fall of her breasts as she breathes. I imagine I can see her rib cage shudder with the beat of her heart underneath and to prove it, I press my palm lightly against her chest, feeling the diastole and systole pumping life through her veins and the the veins of the child she’s carrying. 

“Sherlock,” she breathes, arching under my hand, shifting so that my palm covers her breast. I can feel the slight rise of her nipple under the thin layers of her dress and bra and that inexplicably makes my mouth water.

Possibly the most fascinating thing about sex is the completely bolloxed physical responses to unrelated stimuli.

I brush my fingers over the folds of the fabric where it cris-crosses between her breasts, tied up under them by a length of silk. Such a simple wrap-around design, apparently specifically made to open, to _unwrap_ \-- I curl my fingers into the knot pause, and wonder at my sudden hesitation. She reaches for me, sliding fingers into my hair at the nape of my neck and pulls me down to her. 

The kiss is slow and deep and the velvet slide of her tongue twisting around mine makes me moan like she’s broken something deep inside me.  She has, for all I know. Certainly this flood, this torrent of emotion, this deluge of sentiment for her must have been blockaded somewhere inside me. It rushes through me as her hands slide over me, opening my shirt with deft fingers and sliding across my skin, my hair, my face in a cascade of caresses.

She moans into my mouth and I realize that I’ve been so focused on the feel of her hands on my skin that I failed to realize that my hands, seemingly of their own volition, have begun stroking over her body, sliding across the silk of her skin and her dress. She twists towards me and slides my coat, my jacket and my shirt all at once off my shoulders and down my arms. 

The willpower necessary to relinquish the touch of her skin is immense but I’ve always had good self control and I manage to do it just long enough to unbutton my cuffs and shuck the many layers of fabric to the floor somewhere behind me before sliding my palms back across the smooth hot skin of her neck drinking in the touch of her. 

“Sherlock, you are beautiful, do you know that?” she says, relinquishing my lips with nip and pushing me away from her so she can get a good look.

Something new now, a flutter in the pit of my stomach that somehow controls my eyes which refuse to meet her’s, the subtle pattern of the silk takes my entire attention and  I can feel a flush spreading, and I wonder if she can see it. 

“Just transport, Mary.”

“You’re a bloody Lamborghini then, honestly. Or no, a Ferrari. You’re more stallion than bull, the fine long lines of you. You’re like a fucking thoroughbred.”

She drifts the fingers of one hand lazily around my collar bone and it’s as if a knot that my intestines have surreptitiously wound in me loosens and my eyes are mine to control again.  I bend over her, and her palm sliding over my shoulder is gentle and soft and when she cups the back of my neck, I lower my mouth to her’s again, desperate for the feel of her lips and her tongue and now, goddamn it, oh  _hell_  her _teeth_..

I can’t-- I just can’t. I feel the tenuous control I have over myself slipping fast as she scrapes her teeth over my lips and pulls me harder against her and I know she’s doing it on purpose, replacing my hesitation with need, manipulating me with desire and I want. I want so much, I want everything.

She disengages our lips, moaning softly with every breath, leaving me aching for more.

“What...tell me what. What you like,” I stammer against her lips, licking at their softness and cupping her breasts with shaking hands. I can’t take my hands off them, I have no idea why, no idea what I’m doing. It’s suddenly very disconcerting.

“Nope. I’ve been waiting a long time for this. I want the focus of that beautiful brain on me.”

She wipes her lips across mine and up over my cheeks, and I can feel her eyelashes flutter against mine and this somehow makes my hips twitch hard against the the side of the bed, and I gasp with the sudden friction.

“Deduce me, you beautiful madman.” she says then, and twists beneath me, tugging at my arms and my chest. 

“ _Mary_ ,” I moan her name, allowing my voice to catch, to break just a little. My first deduction is a success. She thrashes once beneath my hands, pressing her breast further into my palms. I rub at her nipples through her dress and she keens softly, so responsive, so sensitive, and I wonder if I can make her come from that, just this, my lips and hands and fingers and teeth and my tongue on those hard, sensitive little nubs of flesh. 

“Fuck, yes, yes, Sherlock, _please_...” She moans and I realize I’ve been vocalizing my thoughts. It’s the voice again...maybe the words. I need to find out, discover how to break her apart into her basic elements and reduce her to need beyond words then bring her back again.

“I’m going to unknot this dress and slowly open it, exposing a centimeter of your skin at a time,” I explain softly. We’re close enough that my lips move against hers as I speak, and I don’t need to do anything to roughen my voice. Apparently it does that by itself when I’m rutting against the side of the bed while unravelling a person.

“I want to observe you, Mary, I want to watch your skin flush beneath my fingers and my lips and taste every part of you.” She whimpers and arches again as I make good on my words, staring at me with wide eyes. 

I pull open the knot and pull her dress open, following the path of silk with my lips as it falls softly to her sides. Her breasts are round and full and they cast shadows over her sternum in the harsh light from the window, the black lace bra contrasting sharply with her pale skin. I let my eyelids drift closed and continue to map the contours of her body with my fingertips, cataloguing every place that causes her breath to hitch and her muscles to tighten.

By the end of the night, I will be able to transform her to a trembling, moaning, needing compilation of nerve endings with a touch and a word, but I must find out how.

I slide my cheek across her breasts as I run my fingers over the slight dip and ridge of her ribs and feel her nipples pucker under the thin fabric of her bra. She arches her back as I fish for the catch between the wings of her shoulder blades. Impatient, I mouth at a stiff peak through her bra, and her reaction is far more violent than I expected. Her body tenses and she rakes her fingers through my hair, pressing the plush softness of her breast firmly against my lips and keens wordlessly.

“God,” I  murmur, finally, finally figuring out the damn catch and sliding the lace away from her skin. I slide my hands over her breasts and cup them, kissing down the cleft between and tonguing the puckered skin of a truly surprising scar there and my hips flex against the bed again.

“Sherlock, come up here,” Mary gasps and tugs on my shoulders, rolling away from me onto the bed and I follow her, like some kind of mindless heat-seaking drone, unwilling to let any space come between us. 

She turns back towards me as I slide onto the bed beside her and wraps her arms around my shoulders, pressing her body against my bare chest and the heat and the softness of her skin, the scent of her as I bury my face in her neck drive conscious thought from me for some seconds until she speaks.

 “Christ, you’re so... hard,”

I don’t know whether she means the muscles knotting down my back or the state of my cock at the moment as she slides her palms down my back and over the swell of my arse. I stroke down the soft curve of her spine, counting off the vertebrates by name to distract me from the burning ache of my erection. She’s wearing nothing but tiny lace knickers now, they barely cover the swell of her bottom.

I slip fingers under the fabric cupping her cheeks and stroke the soft skin under the lacy edge and she brings her hips forward, pressing her pelvis against my cock and I pull breath after hissing breath between the millimeters separating my lips from her neck. She rolls her hips up against me and her skin slides against mine, and I give up utterly, my body’s demands overriding my intellectual curiosity.

I curse softly, and she gasps as I push aways from her, rolling her onto her back and getting to my knees in order to divest myself of my remaining clothing, and I can barely undo the buckle of my belt because my fingers are shaking and she’s being incredibly distracting, shimmying her way out of those knickers, clad now only in shifting shadows. Her fingers are on mine, hastening me, yanking my trousers down my hips.

“You fucking gorgeous bastard!” she laughs and abruptly, I’m on my back and my trousers and pants are flying through the air somewhere to our right and she’s on me, sliding over me, her lips and hands sliding across my skin, pulling moans from my throat as she kisses and bites lines of fire over my chest and belly. She nudges a knee between my thighs and I rock my hips up, sliding my cock against her and she stretches out on top of me, licking and nibbling my neck before biting down hard and slicking her hand down my cock at the same time. 

Every muscles in my body convulses and I shout her name and arch beneath her, clamping my arms around her body to make her still as I fight my way back from the brink. 

“Not like this. Please,” I manage, and she moans and straddles my thighs, rising to her knees and lightly stroking my cock, a teasing pleasure.

“You have _no idea_ , Sherlock,” I can’t see her expression, but her voice is dark and broken. “John told me how...god, how beautiful you are but I didn't...You’re the most gorgeous man I have ever set eyes on, and that’s saying a lot considering who my husband is. And I get to have you. Do you even know? Do you have any idea how beautiful you are? I am actually going to fuck an angel.”

I smile. It is literally impossible not to smile while she’s saying these ridiculous beautiful things.

“Whatever I am, Mary, I’m not an angel. But if a mere mortal will suffice, you can have me regardless.” She giggles and crawls over my body, sliding her breasts against my chest and reaching down to between us to grasp my cock and her hand is small and warm and steady as she positions me.

She dips low and brushes the glans of my penis over the soft, wet folds between her legs, and my grip on her hips must be bruising, but I can’t seem to loosen my fingers, indeed all I can do as she slides onto me is shake and gasp her name over and over again, a shamelessly repetitive litany of adoration.

It’s like nothing I have ever felt before, this sweet, wet, blood-hot tightness inside her. She pulls slowly back only to sink down, seating herself more fully, grinding herself down onto me and it’s too much for me, too much altogether. I arch beneath her, tighten my grip on her hips and plunge into her.

She cries out and, God, I hope it’s not too much-- I have no idea what to do if it is, seeing as though my body seems to be wholly out of my control, but her cries are ecstatic, not pained and she’s pushing herself down to meet my thrusts, each movement sending roiling waves of heat and spiking pleasure through me.

I’m speaking, I hear my voice, but understanding what I’m saying is beyond me, and I hope it’s not anything that will put her off, something about mine and ours and fuck and Christ. 

She leans over and takes my lips with hers, pressing her body against mine and changing the angle of entry causing a new wave of incandescent heat to sweep outward from the junction of our bodies. I scream into her neck and chase my orgasm deep in the very core of her, crushing her against me and soaking up her moans and her breath with my lips as she jolts and shakes against me, her muscles clamping around me as she comes in waves that I can feel in my own body. 

She collapses onto me and we lay gasping in each other’s arms, and I almost lose myself in the knowledge that I am still inside her, physically connected in a way I have never been. I wonder if John will feel as amazing with I penetrate him for the first time and I’m so sated, so deliciously glutted on our pleasure that I can consider that without immediately becoming hard. 

“Did I break you?” Mary asks, her lips sliding against the sweaty slick skin of my neck. I tighten my arms around her with the last of my strength and shake my head. 

“Don’t be absurd. Breaking is the utter opposite of what you’ve done.” She hums in agreement, and shifts her hips, sighing as I slide out of her, and moving to a more comfortable position tucked against my side. I wrap my arm around her shoulder, drawing her still closer until her whole front covers my entire side. 

She tucks her head under my chin and her hand curls, relaxed on my chest, and a new kind of warmth spreads through me, and I twine my legs in hers. The only thing that could make this moment any better at all is the presence of John, and the knowledge of that that impossible circumstance is so close and so reachable makes me embarrassingly giddy.

“Why are you _laughing_?” Mary cries in mock outrage, taking the edge of even that off by carding gentle fingers through my hair. I press into her touch and smile. 

“Because you’re impossible. You are too...it is impossible for someone like me to have this with you and John.” 

“A man once wrote that when you remove the impossible, whatever is left, however improbable is the truth. Posted it on a blog after a monograph about cigar ash.”

“He sounds like a tosser.” 

“Oh, he is. But that doesn’t make him less than completely right. You _have_ us, Sherlock, implausible though that may seem. Both of us, for as long as you can stand us.” 

My heart contracts painfully, and I shut my eyes against a piercing pang of sentiment and turn my head and nuzzle against her temple, rubbing my cheek against her hair.

“Forever, Mary. I made a vow that I intend to keep.”

She makes a sort of choking cry and throws her leg over my hips and we cannot physically be  any closer and it is perfection, pure and simple. I reach one arm across the bed and pull the duvet over our bodies and drift with her in the quiet peace of our home.

 

 


	44. Chapter 44

File: Voltaire

Status: Password Protected

Case Notes:

My earlier conclusion concerning the necessity of misfortune and shared misery as a building blocks for successful romantic relationships has turned out to be not wholly correct.

In my defense, my misunderstanding was based on incomplete data rather than a breakdown of the argument. I still maintain that my the unassailable strength of my relationship with John is a direct result of the trauma we endured. It never occurred to me that there might be other, equally powerful catalysts.*

I have always assumed that sexual intercourse was the fruition of romantic attachment. Certainly, intimacy with John was merely** the physical manifestation of preexisting intense feelings.

Mary has proven to me that physical intimacy lead directly to increased emotional attachment. The profound psychological and emotional effects of our coupling are incontrovertible proof that this is true.

Before we slept together, our relationship was a tenuous thing, rife with mutual misunderstanding and self conscious doubt. After, in the course of _one evening_ the nature of our relationship seems to have quickly reached nearly the level of that which I have with John.

The phrase “The sum of a whole is greater than its parts,” nonsensical though it sounds, seems to be an apt explanation for the change wrought by the mingling of our bodies. Utterly sublime though the experience was, it ought not to have been capable of causing the tectonic shift in our lives. It is possible that I have drastically underestimated the efficacy of the Transport in matters of emotion.

The ultimate irony is, of course, that immediately after proving that the spectre of misfortune is not a requisite for increased intimacy, it visited us all the same, this time presenting in the form of Lady Elizabeth Smallwood, a peer of my brother’s who, like Mary, finds herself at the nonexistent mercy of Charles Augustus Magnussen.

So, I have a case. The case to end all cases. The chance to expose the secrets of the most odious man I have ever encountered and the task has been put to me, not only by one whom I love but also someone who, if I succeed in helping her, will never let Mycroft live it down.

It’s Christmas and Easter and Hanukkah all at once. The perfect game, one that even Moriarty could not have provide because it’s real. By all rights I should be ecstatic. However, I find my excitement tempered by equally intense regret due mostly to the fact that the plan which has the highest chance of success involves a period of prolonged absence from 221B under circumstances which, were I to reveal them to my... John and Mary*** would cause anxiety and unhappiness.

It is fortunate that Mary and I had this phenomenal breakthrough prior to Lady Smallwood’s appearance.

I have seen the lengths to which I have pushed John and my current plan involves nothing remotely so extreme, so I can be confident that my relationship with him will withstand the necessary absence and unhappiness.

Now I am sure of Mary as well. Absolutely everything about her, every physical tell, every nuance of expression speaks to the fact that she is as committed to me as I am to her.

It is the most extraordinary thing that I have ever experienced, to be the focus of affection from them both. It makes me feel quite invincible.

I want this to be over with before it has even started. Usually the Work is reward enough, but it seems that is no longer the case. I have somehow managed to achieve something I never had the slightest idea I was capable of having and I want to explore it more than I want to work a case.

But Magnussen is a very real danger and I will not allow anything to threaten that which I love. I will _bury_ him and Mary and John and their child will be safe and I will give them the happiness they deserve.

This time, though, I will not leave without warning as I’ve been prone to do in the past. I have set my intent down in a note and I will check in via text periodically to make sure that they are not unduly distressed by my absence.  This is what is referred to as being a ‘good boyfriend’**** I believe.

 

*I once asked Mycroft if the there was something wrong with us. The fact that I considered misery to be the only channel by which I might reach happiness proves that yes, there very much is.

**I say ‘merely.’ He ripped my soul out of my body, broke me down to my constituent parts and put me back together again, much improved, _and_ made it feel like what I imagine idiots who believe in such things think heaven feels like. Certainly he’s done all that before in one way or another, but never from _inside_ me.

***Standard relationship nomenclature does not extend to our situation. What shall I call them? Partners? Lovers? Certainly both are accurate in every sense.

****I am neither boy nor simply friend. The English language is rubbish. I must create a more suitable appellation.

 

 


	45. Chapter 45

“John, it’s been a week. I am now officially worried.”

“Yes, I know. I am too. He hasn’t answered your texts either then?”

“No. The last thing I heard from him was what you heard. ‘On a case, be back later but don’t wait up or you’ll die of sleep deprivation. -SH’ Who even leaves that kind of message?

“Sherlock bloody Holmes, that’s who. You know, honestly, I thought after… after everything... he would have learned.”

“He did learn, after a fashion. He left the message, after all.”

“Bollocks! We don’t know where he is, we don’t know what kind of trouble he’s in-- and I guarantee he’s in some kind of trouble, Mary-- and we can’t. Contact him.  Mycroft can’t even track him down. And you think that fucking message is supposed to make it all ok?”

“Of course I don’t think that! I’m as furious as you are, or can’t you fucking tell? But I do think that he thinks it’s enough. It’s certainly more than you claim he’s ever done before.”

“God, how? Just. How, Mary, did we think becoming involved with a man with Einstein’s IQ and the emotional maturity of a fucking five year old was a good idea?”

“What, you’re pretending we had a choice? I know I didn’t, especially not after...Shit, shit. John, tell me he’ll be alright. Just...say the words. Please.”

“Jesus, come here. Just...come here. I don’t know what he’s doing, or why he left without one of us to back him up, but I do honestly believe he’ll come back to us, more or less uninjured. I think even he understands what will happen if he doesn’t.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah?”

“No. But it’ll have to do for now I--oh my God, is that your phone?!”

“YES! It’s…. “

“John? John! What the _fuck_ did he text you, John!?”

“ ‘Stop texting me thirty times a day when I clearly can’t answer. I am physically fine, tho I miss you both so much it is actually causing me pain, which is interesting. Remind Mary to take her prenatal vitamins. -SH’  That’s it. What the absolute fuck?”

“...I’m going to kill him. Well, no, I’m not, but I’m going to beat him. When he gets back, you’re going to hold him down and I’m going to beat him to a bloody pulp. What are you writing?”

“ ‘Tell us where you fucking are you-’ ”

“No!”

“Why the hell not, Mary? It’s no more than he deserves.”

“I’ll grant you that, but he won’t tell you anyway and if something happens-- Just. Tell him we love him. It’s the truth and it might bring him back sooner.”

“Mary, I officially delegate all Sherlock-centric communications to you. You’re far better at it than me. That’s what I meant anyway.”

“I know. I love him too. I want him back so we can all go to bed and maybe die of overdoses of oxytocin. They’ll find us in a sweaty pile of naked limbs on his bed and every one of them will think ‘man, what a way to go.’”

“I have never been aroused and worried sick at the same time. It’s weird. You’ve broken me.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll fix you after you talk to Mycroft. Come to bed and we’ll plan our revenge for when His Nibs designs to grace us once more with his presence.”


	46. Chapter 46

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So this chapter gets us into a very altered version of His Last Vow. It's altered significantly because I really feel like that episode made so little damn sense. Next few chapters are my take on how that all went down, from various perspectives. Hope y'all enjoy!!

File: Voltaire

Status: Password Protected

Case Notes:

I have badly miscalculated.  

I simply do not understand. It’s the drugs, I think, that pushed them over whatever arbitrary line in the sand exists. I was only gone a month, and...I texted...

It has to be the drugs...Why can they not understand that I had to play a part? It was a necessary...thing. _Though it was nice to_ \-- No!

Bottom line: I couldn’t have kept my cover if I didn’t--- indulge. And Molly. My cheek still hurts. She _hit_ me. That hurt something else as well which makes no sense.

My plan worked perfectly. I went away, I played my part perfectly...became the junkie again and now Magnussen’s got what he needs on me, has my ‘pressure point’ down as drugs, and I’m in a perfect position now. But...

They won’t even talk to me. I wanted--I thought I’d come home and we’d… And he called _Mycroft_?

And he-- Anderson and-- in _our_ flat. John let them in and… he doesn’t trust me. I don’t _need_ it anymore, damn it, I have _them_. Why can’t they _understand_?

And Mycroft. I have never seen him so adamant that I let something lie. What can Magnussen have on him? Something...otherwise why would he… I think I actually hurt him, on the way out. I don’t mind. He deserved it, he’s a rubbish big brother.

He treated John like...he could threaten him. But John, my John...Not mine. I am theirs but they… they are not mine.

I _tried_. I was foolish for believing it could ever work, that I could ever give them what they need from me.

I can’t… I don’t know how to live my life without hurting them. It hurts. It _burns_.

I can’t give them what they want from me, but I can do one thing. I _will_ make them safe. I will do whatever it takes to make it safe for them.  

I must alter my original plan… using Janine to get into the office is not an option now-- such a thing will only compound the problems I have inadvertently created. I’ll use Mycroft instead. Over Christmas. Even now, they'll come if I ask...

I will take the files from Appledore itself and damn the consequences. Mycroft will protect me, and if he doesn’t, what does it matter? This place is a prison without them now. If I’m to be so wretchedly lonely, I’d prefer solitude in any case.


	47. Chapter 47

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> HLV missing scene. Ouch.

Tapping. Tap tap tap. On my cheek. It’s annoying-- so _irritating_. I slap ineffectually at the source and my hand is arrested, trapped in a warm grasp. I feel my lips curl into a smile. John.

A warm, _shaking_ hand.

Abruptly, I remember that I hadn’t just fallen asleep and my eyes snap open. John’s face swims into view above me and I immediately realize that something is very, very wrong. His eyes are wide and staring in his pale, drawn face. He looks shell shocked.  

“Jesus Christ, what’s happened? John, what’s wrong?”

His jaw works and his eyes fill with tears and instead of answering, he reaches forward and draws me to him, his body shaking as a sob wracks him. Automatically I wrap my arms around his shoulders, shifting my bulky abdomen to allow me closer to him.

I can hear Mycroft’s voice indistinct in the background and the sudden shocked cry of his mother from the kitchen and I gasp  and struggle against an onslaught of dizziness as I reach the only conclusion apparent.

“No,” John says as I clench around him. “Not that. Not that, but...he’s gone, Mary. He’s not dead, but he’s gone.”

His voice is broken and his tears soak into the skin at the nape of my neck as I struggle to understand.

“Gone how? John, please…”

“We were at Appledore and---” He takes a shaking breath and pulls me back, staring into my eyes, his face contorting as he struggles through it. I want to kiss him, to soothe him but I can’t, my own heart is too low, too frozen. “He--god. Mary, Sherlock made a mistake. There were no documents, no vaults. It was all in his head...in Magnussen’s head. He had a--- a mind palace too.”

The words seep into my shocked, drug-addled brain and take root and suddenly I know. I know exactly what Sherlock has done because it is precisely what I would have done in his place.

Waves of dizziness wash over me as adrenaline messes with whatever fucked up chemistry I’ve been subjected to. Guilt is swiftly outweighing any anger I should feel about the drugging as facts slot themselves clumsily into place.    

He didn’t have an exit strategy-- didn’t think that far ahead. It must have been...He must have not cared, must have been willing to accept his capture. It’s easy to believe, though the thought makes me so nauseous I have to clench my mouth to stop myself from gagging. It makes sense, especially if he thought we no longer...fuck.

We’ve been so cold to him since the drugs thing. I should have...we should have...and now he’s-- gone? It can’t be. It _can not_ be.

“There were witnesses.” I barely recognize my voice as I rasp out what isn’t really a question.  

“Yes.”

“And Mycroft knows?

John’s eyes harden. “Yeah. He was there...He must have regained consciousness quicker than his parents. Maybe Sherlock didn’t dose him as much. His agents took Sherlock away.”

I nod curtly and begin to struggle to my feet, fighting an overwhelming lassitude all the way. John automatically reaches down and helps me and I smooth the tunic across my abdomen and take a deep breath and shake my head.

The unfairness of this is...frankly enraging. I cling to that rage, willing it to burn through the miasma of dizziness and weakness, using it to clear my mind as I steel myself.  I can hear agitated voices in the kitchen and it is in this direction that I move.

“Myc, you have to _do_ something!” Mrs. Holmes slams her fist into the antique wood of the butcher’s block just as I step through the door, John close at my heels. Her bright blue eyes are fierce and her face is set. Her husband is sitting slouched in a chair across the room, still in the process of waking.

“Mummy, there is nothing I _can_ do.  There are no fewer than twelve witnesses. He chose to pursue this man despite my express orders and he must now face the consequences of his actions.”

“So _that’s_ what this is about,” I snap, finding myself the focus of two intense gazes.

“You actually think he did this just to spite you.” John pitches in, his voice thin with disbelief. “Mycroft, do you honestly think this was about _you_?”  

“Of course not. John, you know better than anyone what this was about. ‘The game is on,’ I believe was his turn of phrase. Well, he lost this time. And you allowed him to put himself in a position where that was remotely possible.”

“Don’t blame John for this, Myc, don’t you dare. He’s done more--”

“To what end, Mummy? Sherlock-- Sherlock is _lost_. Despite all of our efforts.” 

“Efforts! You call this an effort?” I grind out, advancing across the kitchen. “You can fill a goddamn plane full of corpses, but you can’t fix it with twelve witnesses who _work for you_.  This is what you’re telling us?”

“Myc, what’s she talking about?” Mrs. Holmes voice sounds suddenly tenuous and I wonder if she’s ready for everything I’m about to tell her about her son if I don’t hear something I want to hear.

“Clearly, Mary is still suffering from being drugged by Sherlock. Surely her pregnancy has complicated matters. She’s confused,” Mycroft deadpans, narrowing his eyes at me.

I feel my fingers twitch and John’s hand closes over my upper arm. It’s all that keeps Mycroft bloody Holmes breathing at the moment. Well, the fact that he can’t help Sherlock if he’s dead.

“I’d be happy to discuss all the other things I’ve _hallucinated_ in the garden, Mycroft,” I growl. He stares at me but people have been trying to stare me down my whole life. He gets no further than anyone else.

I exit through the kitchen and leave the door open behind me, letting the chill into the house. I try to compose myself, to bank the rage firing through me.

“Mycroft Holmes, you are an idiot if you think for one moment we are going to allow you to pretend you can’t do something about this situation,” I say when I hear him approach behind me.

“Well, _Mary Watson_ , if that’s what you’re pleased to call your self these days, give me one good reason to exercise my influence in this case. I warned him off. He ignored the warning. The game was too important. There is nothing I can do.”

“Nothing you _will_ do.” John’s voice is shaking in rage. “And you still think this is about a _game_. You don’t understand--”

“He sacrificed himself for us!” I hiss as I crowd into the tall man’s space. I feel my nails bite into my palms as I struggle to restrain myself.  I don’t know him well, but I recognize the supercilious, condescending expression on his face all too well, even though it looks so much better on Sherlock. “I will not be the damsel in distress, Mycroft. Fix this for him or--”

“Or what? Do you for one moment think that Charles Augustus Magnussen is the only one who knows all your naughty secrets? You assume Sherlock sacrificed his life and his freedom to keep this knowledge safe, an assumption which has no basis in reality, by the way. Would you risk what he’s saved by trying to threaten someone else who has the same power over you? You don’t _matter_ to me enough to bother with you. See to it that it stays that way.

“As for Sherlock, he’s crossed the line one too many times. There is nothing. I. Can do. Or will do. Whichever. His actions were...regrettable. I will do what I can to spare him official sanction, but he is either government property now, an asset to be used as they see fit, or he will be tried as a murderer and spend the rest of his life in a cage. That is all. There is a car waiting behind you to take you back to your flat. Should I hear that you have contacted my parents, Mrs. Watson, things will not go well for you. This is not a threat. It is a promise.”

He turns his back on me and, again, John’s gentle grip is all that keeps his blood within his body.

“Mycroft--” John’s voice is shaking behind me. Mycroft Holmes stiffens and stops in his tracks. His head cocks to the side, the only sign that he is listening.

“Let us see him. Before. Before whatever happens happens. Please.”

He turns and when he faces us, his mask has slipped sideways a bit, allowing a sliver of grief to shine through as he looks at my husband.

“For you, John. I will do what I can.”

He disappears into the cottage and the door slams. 


	48. Chapter 48

“Sir, may I offer an opinion?”

I can sense him rolling his eyes, even though I’m staring at my mobile. Checking stock market fluctuations at the moment. You can always tell when there’s going to be a….

“Have I ever been able to stop you, Anthea?”

Oh yes. right.

“I think you’ve misjudged the situation.”

“Impossible.”

“Not remotely. You’ve never been what one would call objective where your brother is concerned, sir. You’ve admitted it yourself.”

“Anthea, my little brother has finally bitten off more than he can chew, that’s all there is to it. Just look at him.”

I spare Sherlock a glance through the one directional mirror. He’s sitting on the floor leaning against the wall with his eyes closed and his fingers tented in front of his lips. I recognize the posture and suppress a smile with great difficulty. These two men are so alike and hell will freeze solid before they admit it. It would be tiresome if it wasn’t so entertaining.

“He hasn’t moved or spoken in four days. If, as you claim, he acted for altruistic reasons, one would assume he’d have asked to see those whom he has saved. In fact he specifically requested that I exclude them.  Probably because he doesn’t want to deal with the aftermath of his little escapade. No, Anthea, he’s overstepped his bounds for the sake of whatever game he plays in his head and it’s about time he payed the price.”

It’s my turn to roll my eyes.

“You actually believe I’m wrong.”

I raise an eyebrow.

“When is the last time I misjudged a situation such as this?”

There goes my other eyebrow and then I frown.  Something about the way the Nasdaq’s trending is just not...

“Well if there’s any way to prove it, it would be to bring them in, but there’s no time.” he says, sounding just a little too smug. I frown again. I had something for this...planned… oh yes.

“They’re in room B. I thought you might have a change of heart.”

Silence. A sigh.

“Very well.”

I shoot off a quick text and a few minutes later, the door to Sherlock’s holding cell opens to admit Dr. Watson and his wife. I spare her a quick look. Not what one would expect from an assassin of her caliber but then, that’s the point isn’t it? Sherlock has recoiled against the wall, his shouts of protest are audible even in here. Mycroft takes one look at his enraged expression and turns away, smiling at me with infuriating condescension.

“Anthea, they are, as I suspected, nothing more than an inconvenience. So now--” I reach over and press the intercom button without averting my gaze from the very worrying graph unravelling before my eyes. We’re surrounded by an explosion of sound.

“God no. Why are you _here_. Just go! I _can’t_ \--”

I always thought Sherlock’s voice was magnificent, though it’s not something I’d ever actually say out loud. However, even I wince at the heartbreak expressed in that deep baritone. Can’t be helped, I suppose.

I can feel Mycroft’s sudden stillness. No need to look at the expression on his face as he turns to face the glass. I hide my own smug grin behind my blackberry.

“Sherlock--” I look up to see Mary forcibly override Sherlock’s avoidant posture and fit herself against him. After a moment, he locks his arms around her and sort of crumples.

I have to admit, I can’t look away. I’ve been observing Sherlock on behalf of his brother for over twenty years and I have never seen such a display of emotion. He’s actually sobbing.

“You-- you made us a promise, Sherlock.” John Watson's voice reflects his rigid posture as he stands apart, hands clenched in fists. “You said you’d always be there for us.”

Sherlock clenches his jaw and folds himself over Mary who has apparently dissolved into tears in his arms.

“John, I had to. You were _there_. There was no other choice. It was the only way to keep you safe.” His voice is strained to cracking, his eyes pleading. “Please, forgive me.”

John tucks his chin in and scowls until Mary peels herself away.

“For god’s sake, John. What’s done is done. He did it for me, for our child, for you. There’s no time for this.”

“I know! Don’t you think I know?” John shouts, stumbling forward and grasping Sherlock’s arm, pulling him roughly around.

“I can’t lose you again. Sherlock, tell me you have a plan...tell me--anything. Give me hope. Give me _something_.”

I find myself holding my breath as Sherlock stares down at John before pulling him close and pressing lips to his forehead.

“I’d do it again,” he murmurs, and John’s arms tighten convulsively around him.

“God, no, Sherlock, _please_ \--”

“I’d do it a thousand times, John. I will always do what I can to keep you safe. I love you both.”

Mary joins them and they stand close, leaning against each other, silent.

Well. What is there to say after all?

I can’t bring myself to look at Mycroft. I almost regret bringing this to his attention. But it’s my job to see that he’s making _informed_ decisions. Some types of information are just harder to accept that others.

The door opens across the room and John squeezes his eyes shut, steadfastly ignoring it. It’s Mary who pulls back first, searching Sherlock’s face and biting her lip.

“We’ll be there when you leave,” she says simply, slipping an arm around John as Sherlock disengages. John sags towards her, his eyes still shut. “And we will be there when you return,” she finishes, glaring towards the mirror.

Her voice is quiet, and there is steel there. I see Mycroft stiffen ever so slightly and fight another smile. Good on her.

John opens his eyes and gazes long at Sherlock before allowing Mary to draw him away towards the door. Sherlock stares after them for a few moments after the door shuts, then reaches for the pitcher on the table in front of him and shakily pours some water. He hefts the glass in his hand and regards it for some time before hurling it violently at the opposite wall. The pitcher follows in a rather impressive explosion of glass. He pitches back against the wall and slides down until he’s sitting before wrapping his arms around his knees and shaking.

My boss turns slowly to me and I’ve never seen this particular expression on his face. I hope I never see it again.

“Get me the Lady Smallwood, please, Anthea,” he says quietly.

“Sir, the Nasdaq has plummeted. You’re aware that probably means--”

“It can wait. The Lady Smallwood, on the phone. Now. Please.”

I nod and duck through the door, letting it close behind me, but not before I see Mycroft Holmes turn back towards the glass and rest his head against it.

I smile to myself even as I dial Smallwood’s PA. I am never wrong.

 


	49. Chapter 49

“It must look real. It must hurt. He actually needs to _leave_ , Mycroft, or no one will believe it.”

“Agreed.”

“It’s not kind, what you’re doing.”

“No one has ever accused me of being kind, madam. Sherlock has more utility at home than abroad. I was not lying in that room. Once in a while, we require a scalpel.”

“You are right, of course. I only wish....”

“You have my sympathy, Elizabeth.  If Sherlock had been quicker--”

“I do not blame your brother for my husband’s death. And Magnussen is dead. I can ask for no better justice than that, I suppose.”

“There are worse things than death. Had Sherlock not gotten in the way we would have--”

“Perhaps next time, we ought to be more...forthcoming when your brother’s path crosses our own.”

“You may not be entirely wrong about that, Elizabeth.”

“So. Moriarty. He’s the threat necessary. Are you prepared to accept responsibility should things go wrong?”

“Should it become necessary, I will assume complete responsibility.”

“Let us hope it does not become necessary.”

“Indeed.”

 

 


	50. Chapter 50

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There will be a sexpilogue. But this is the story's natural end I think. :D Thanks for coming along for the ride! I really enjoyed it!

The crossover between psychological and physiological always simultaneously fascinated and appalled me.

The release of chemicals in response to dangerous external stimuli provides us with the fight-or-flight reaction that has allowed us to survive in world full of peril while simultaneously shutting down our higher functions, denying us of our one true weapon against that world--the ability to reason.

_Sentiment_. What wires have crossed in our brains that allow such a nebulous thing to cause the same physical reaction as an actual threat?

On this runway, there is no gunman poised to annihilate me, no assassin hiding in the shadows-- no physical threat whatsoever.

So why, for _god’s sake_ , are my circulatory and respiratory systems accelerated? Why do I tremble? Why can I not swallow, or breathe or hear anything over the hammering of my own pulse or see anything other than the slow approach of the sedan across the tarmac?

Perhaps my body has already deduced what my mind could not, has understood what constitutes actual peril. Perhaps my subconscious has already divined what I am only now quantifying in thought: the fact that I am to be denied them, denied him for the rest of my life is more dangerous to me than ripping knives or piercing bullets. The idea of farewell with this degree of finality-- it is crippling.

That makes a surprising amount of sense. The same reflexive, gut wrenching nausea that once kept me from accidentally imbibing poisoned wine twists within me now. The thought of life without them--It is poison to my system and the transport is rebelling.

I will never admit it to him, but it is likely that Mycroft was right after all. Sentiment is not an advantage. Sentiment is choking me, killing me.

I cast around, desperate for something to take my attention and reflexively pull out my phone, noting the time. Right now, the package I had made ready last night will be arriving at Baker Street. It contains my will, endowing John and Mary with all my possessions and the revenues of my trust and eventually my inheritance as well as a thumb drive with two videos on it. One for them and one for the child I will never meet. It seemed maudlin to me, even as I created them,  but I am positive John will appreciate it, and I rather think Mary will too, and since my choices have enforced our separation…

The phone falls from my shaking fingers as the car pulls close. As I bend to retrieve it, I pray to a god that doesn’t exist that they will take pity on me and simply leave. I don’t know how to do what it is we must do. I don’t know how to walk away from them.

Mary must see it in me as soon as she steps from the car. She embraces me, her budding belly pressed into the concave bend of my own as she presses quickly against me, kissing my cheek, quipping about John, setting a bearable tone for this horrible leavetaking.

But try as I might, I cannot miss the unshed tears in her eyes, I can not help deduce the long string of sleepless nights in the style of her hair, the texture of her skin, can’t help but see the signs of strain and grief. For the first time, I wish I was not myself. I long for the willful ignorance that plagues the rest of humanity because recognizing her pain hurts me in ways I can’t describe.

And then there is John. Every hurt I’ve endured throughout my life, every cut and burn and break and bruise has been but training for the anguish that sweeps through me as he stares up at me.

I can’t hide it from him, he knows me too well. But he, apparently, can hide from me.

Somehow I’ve requested that we be given a moment of privacy...I don’t remember doing so, but we’re standing apart from everyone now and I realize my mistake.

This is the dangerous moment where I teeter on the precipice. If I go to him, if I break, and touch him and hold him, they will have to drag me away at gun-point. They will have to kill me, because I can’t... _I can not_ …

But of course, John can. And does. He talks about illusive words as I try to find my own, try to coalesce ideas like love and desperate and need and regret into sentences while we make jokes about my name of all things on autopilot. The effort nearly distracts me until he smiles a wincing, sobbing smile and asks what’s next for me and it occurs to me that he still doesn’t realize the utter finality of this situation. God help me, I can’t bring myself to inform him. Six months I say. After that, who knows?

I know. Oblivion and the absence of his absence. I can feel Mycroft’s eyes on me, and I know we’re running out of time.

I peel my glove off and reach for him, rooting my feet to the tarmac to keep the rest of my body from following.

“To the very best of times,”

He stares at my hand in confusion and it strikes me suddenly that this, the same hand that has stroked his naked flesh, pulled moans and words and love from his body, is now bizarrely relegated to the most impersonal of caresses. It makes the life I had till recently, warmed by the intimacy and companionship of this man, feel at once distant and unreachable. Finally, his fingers close around mine and his hand is, as ever, warm and hard and comforting. His touch steadies me, reminding me why I chose this path, what my sacrifice is for.

He makes it possible for me to leave him.

He gives me strength when he has none left for himself.

I hear him stagger a bit behind me when I turn away, but I know.. I know what will happen if I look back. I don’t. It’s all I can do.

It is all I can do.

 

~~~

 

“What...what did he say?” It’s already almost too much, and Mary's question, whispered soft next to my ear sends a kick of pain right through me. But. She needs...this. She deserves it.

“He. Well, he said we should name our daughter after him. Said that Sherlock was a girl’s name.” She laugh-sobs against me and I hold her closer, rocking her gently, steeling myself. I want to do more, but all I can seem to manage is a bare recitation of my...my last conversation with Sherlock Holmes.

“He said...He said he was off to eastern Europe. Some...mission or something. From Mycroft I suppose.”

I can feel a stillness in her and then the clench of her muscles and I rub my hands over her shoulders, desperate to give her comfort I need so badly.

“Six months, he said. Then ‘who knows.’”  She pulls away roughly and stares at my face and the look in her eyes. God, it freezes me. Stops my blood. I stare blankly. Can’t help it.

“God, John,” She breaths and presses back in, breathing raggedly. I can’t blame her. The thought of him out there, alone, being Sherlock with no one to...God, no one to patch him up or make him fucking tea or hold him when--”

“Dr. Watson!”

I stagger slightly against Mary and desperately fight a surge of nausea as Anthea’s cool voice cuts through the roaring in my ears.

“Goddamn it! Leave us alone for pity’s sake!” Mary snarls.

I cling gratefully to her as she tightens her arm around my waist folding closer into her as the weight of the empty sky presses down on me.

Anthea whisks briskly into our personal space, completely disregards my wife and shoves a phone in my face. I have a split second to wonder if she knows how close she is to a knife in the kidney when all of that drops away.

_Did you miss me? Did you miss me? Did you miss me?_

“What the actual fuck.” I can’t think of anything more appropriate at the moment. I wonder if the bastard knows that Sherlock...Oh god, Sherlock.

“John! But he’s dead! I mean, you told me he was dead, Moriarty.” Mary’s fury masks her terror and I’m confused. (Should get that on a t-shirt, Watson.)

“Absolutely. He blew his own brains out.”

“So how _can_ he be back?” She hides frantic behind the facade of a demand. Before I can ask what’s going on, a glint of light in the sky catches my eye and I turn around, my heart slamming suddenly against my ribs.  Mary’s still staring at the phone. She hasn’t yet seen.

“Well if he is back, he better wrap up warm,” I say slowly, hardly daring to believe my eyes as the returning jet pierces the veil of blue above us. “Because an east wind is coming.”

“What?” Mary says, tearing her eyes off the phone. Then she clasps my arm for balance and gasps when she notices the plane.

“Oh god, they’re. Bringing him...Of course. They _have to_!” she cries, elated.

The jet dips as the landing gear lowers. I glance quickly at Mycroft who nods briefly. Anthea stops the agents moving to intercept the landing plane and Mary and I make our way forward, walking briskly.

By the time the door opens and the stairs lower, we’re sort of jog-trotting. I can’t quite...I can’t quite believe this is happening. In my mind’s eye, I see him falling out of the doorway bleeding from some fatal wound and my heart rate ratchets up another notch and then he’s there, framed by the portal door, his hair whipping in the wind like some sort of beautiful Byronic hero and I almost trip over Mary in my haste to get to him.

As soon as he sees us, he’s moving, scrambling down the stairs and striding towards us, and then we are together, pressed against one another in an impossible, perfect tangle of limbs and coats and lips.

“Oh my God, oh my God, _Sherlock_.” I mutter as relief that's almost orgiastic slams through me. There’s a soft grunt of response and he gathers me closer to him, leaning over both of us. His face is pressed against the crown of my head as he cradles Mary’s body tightly against his side, and I can almost bring myself to believe that he's here, on English soil. That he's home.

“Sherlock, did you see?” Mary asks, pulling back suddenly, and I’m shocked again to see the fear in her eyes. Her hands clasp reflexively around her abdomen. “Did you see the--”

“Of course,” Sherlock rumbles, pulling her back towards him.

“But...he’s dead.” She’s basically begging for confirmation.

“Yes, Mary, dead as a doornail,  I watched him put a bullet in his own brain.” I can hear the smile in his voice. He’s so bloody sure. A wave of relief briefly weakens my knees.

“Then what the hell was that on the phone?”  I ask and I feel him stiffen just as I hear the tapping of an umbrella behind me. Regretfully, I put a few inches of space between myself and the lanky man clinging to my coat like he’s trying to keep it from escaping.

“I believe we’re about to find out,” Sherlock murmurs regarding his brother through narrowed eyes.

“I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about, Sherlock.”

Mycroft. Such a bastard.

“Now, if you can manage to contain your...excessive display of emotion, you must come with me. We have work to do.”

I find myself stepping forward, interposing myself between them. Which is, of course, ridiculous. Even if I had a gun, even with Mary here, we wouldn’t be able to make it past all his agents. But I can’t help myself.  The thought of him taken away from us again is intolerable.

“John, don’t be absurd.” I’m the object of a truly epic eye roll. “Sherlock, come along. Your pardon won’t earn itself.” The smug tosser turns on his heel and makes his way back towards the waiting sedans.

“John--” Sherlock pulls me back towards him, frowning, and I clasp his shoulder.

“No, Sherlock.” I shake my head as he scowls. “Not without us…” I say, squeezing. “Not without me.”

He drops his chin to his chest for a moment, even as Mary begins nodding and disengaging.

“You’ll pardon me if I sit this one out, loves. And you owe me, Sherlock. After she’s born, I get to go on cases. Tons of cases. _All the cases_.”

There’s a moment of silence and I realize Sherlock’s shaking, his head bowed, curls obscuring his expression. I move closer but then he looks up and his face is wreathed in a genuine, cheek-splitting grin. His laughter, when it finally breaks out of his body, is contagious and I find myself chuckling along with him.

“Oh, _God_ , yes,” He finally says, pulling us in for another hug before spinning away towards the gathered agents.

I stand with Mary for a moment, holding her close, feeling her heart beating fiercely against mine.

“John! Come _on_!” Sherlock’s outraged bellow carries on the wind. Mary giggles and releases me.

“His Nibs calls.” Mary laughs against my shoulders, an almost hysterical giggle born of relief. 

“I’ll be back later tonight,” I say, running my fingers through her hair.

“Mmm, no you won’t. But don’t worry. Just...be safe. Come back safe, the both of you.”

I almost can’t handle it...the love I have for this woman. I kiss her softly before turning away.

“Oh, and John?” She hurries forward and begins walking with me down the runway. “One last thing. If this is somehow real and not one of Mycroft’s machinations, you put a bullet all the way into Moriarty’s head and then you make bloody sure that bastard’s _dead_.”

I gape at her.

“You think Mycroft…”

“I don’t know. Just. Make sure. Make sure he’s really, really dead.”

“We’ll make sure, Mary. I promise.”

“I guess….asking for his heart on a plate might be...a bit much?”

I burst out laughing.

“Yeah, love, bit not good, that.”

“John! While we’re young!” Sherlock calls as he ducks into one of the cars.

I laugh out loud, kissing Mary once more for luck and then hop in the waiting sedan with Sherlock, whose face is already vivid with excitement.

“The game is on, John! _The game is on!_ ”


	51. Chapter 51

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And it's done. Finally. Bonus chapter that wraps it all up with a bow and some sex. Cause. Yeah. Sex.

 

“John, sit the hell down. You weren’t this nervous while I was giving birth for Christ’s sakes.” John glances over at Mary who grins wryly from where she’s ensconced in her chair. The silvery afghan that came with it drapes over her shoulder partially obscuring the squirming form of his daughter, cuddled against her breast.

He puts a hand out and steadies himself on the mantle, breathing through another overwhelming shaft of incredulous joy.

“What? You ok?” Mary’s smile shifts slightly, and John lifts his eyebrows in response.

“Yeah. Fine. More than fine. Sorry, I just...Sometimes it’s almost too much, you know?  You and...God, and Charlotte, and now. He’ll be home. Finally. And I can’t. I just.” John breaks off, swallowing convulsively, and sinks slowly into his seat, peripherally aware of the welcome warmth from the crackling fire. “It’s a bit much for me to take in. I keep waiting for Mycroft to call and drop a bomb on us.”

Mary smiles and strokes her hand through her daughter’s soft blond curls thinking _only two months old, and already such a thick head of hair. Must be from John’s side of the family._

“I can’t wait for him to see her…” she murmurs, biting her lip and blinking back surprising tears.

The only person more furious about Sherlock’s enforced absence than Mary had been Sherlock himself.

He and John had taken down Moriarty in less than a month with the help of Mycroft’s team, Lestrade and half the Met. When the smoke cleared, Moriarty was dead. John had fulfilled his promise to his wife and put a bullet in the bastard’s head himself.

However, as Mycroft informed them over Mary’s shouts of righteous fury, official pardons didn’t just happen overnight. Not even for the little brother of the British government. In fact there had been one terrifying week when no one had been sure the pardon would happen at all. Magnussen had had some very powerful friends of his own.

And so for months after doing his duty for Queen and Country, Sherlock had remained in custody with few privileges, none of which included visiting John and Mary during the birth of their daughter.

Sherlock will be the first to explain to you just how inadequate digital photography is when faced with the task of capturing the nature of a newborn Watson. What he won’t tell you is how he hung those grainy cell phone snaps up on his cell wall and how many of the long, tedious hours he spent committing every minute detail, every delicate feature to memory.

John bites his lip nervously and just as he is about to jump up and resume pacing, Mary rises and plunks their child into his arms.

“Your turn, my love. I feel the need for some tea.”

John smiles down at his daughter, who immediately starts to protest her precipitous change in position. He gets to his feet rocks back and forth, and between her quieting complaints and the noises associated with the making of tea, neither he nor Mary hear the sound of the front door opening or the subsequent quiet steps on the stairs.  So it is that Sherlock’s first sight of his family in months is John’s back as he holds Charlotte up towards the window, totally absorbed in her interest in the outside world. Sherlock stills and leans against the doorway, suddenly unwilling to break the tableau before him.

“There, darling, look out there. That’s Baker Street. And down there is Speedy’s where Mummy and Daddy get coffee and scones and Mrs. Hudson gets some special, uhm, favors from Mr. Chatterjee. Sherlock figured that out about fifteen minutes after it happened. He’ll teach you, you know, and you’ll be able look at the lady in the red coat and tell me all about her three year long affair with a lawyer and look at that bloke over there in the long coat and list all the drugs he’s been on for the last few days. That is unless you’re not keen on deduction. You don’t have to be, you know. Maybe you’ll be happier playing the cello or rugby or who knows what. Lord, I hope you don’t develop a fancy for forensic pathology like your godmother… we’ll already have enough body parts in the place when your papa gets home and gets back in his groove and--”

“ _Papa_?” The word falls from Sherlock’s lips in a whisper and John turns towards him with a gasp his as his heart kicks suddenly against his ribs.

Sherlock crosses the room in three long strides, bringing the scent of a brisk London evening into the space John shares with his daughter.

“John,” he breathes as he slips a hand around the back of John’s neck and leans in for a kiss, sighing softly in relief as their lips meet. It’s a warm, tender thing and they linger a moment before Sherlock pulls back and drags his gaze from John’s grin to the bundle of blankets and wide eyes in his arms.  

Charlotte regards him steadily as he strokes long fingers lightly over her silky mop of curls.

“I can’t believe you refused to tell me her name.” Sherlock tries for petulance and falls far spectacularly short as he watches the sleepy girl somberly put her tiny fist in her mouth.

“We wanted to introduce you in person.” Mary says from behind him, and Sherlock leans back into her as she presses herself up against his back, snaking her arms around his waist. “God, I missed you so much, Sherlock.”  

He bites his lip and turns toward her, wrapping himself around her body, tucking her head under his chin and burying his nose in her hair.

“I missed you as well.” He murmurs, meeting John’s eyes over her head. “I could never teach the guards how I take my tea. It was tedious.” He pulls away from Mary as she giggles and sweeps his gaze over her.

“You look well,” he says.

“Oi! Don’t sound so surprised!” Mary punches him lightly in the arm.  “I’ve had two months to get back in shape. _You_ look horny. Wasn’t just the tea you were missing was it?” She winks and he growls and pulls her back against him, swooping low and pressing his lips against hers with a low moan.

“Hey, not in front of the baby!” John laughs, settling onto the couch. Sherlock rolls his eyes and presses closer.

“Nonsense. She’s as yet cognitively incapable of understanding what we’re doing. And even if she was aware, I have been lead to believe that obvious displays of affection are beneficial for--”

“Kidding, Sherlock. I’m just incredibly jealous, is all. You’re not the only one who's been pining. Get over here and sit down.”

“John, did you tell him yet?”

“What, without you around? I fancy my kidneys whole and un-stabbed, thanks. Sherlock, kindly remove your hands from Mary’s ass and plant yours on this couch and meet our offspring.”

“Very well, though as you know, I am singularly inexperienced with things like, ah. Holding children of any age let alone a very young child so perhaps. Um. Oh.”

John more or less shoves his daughter into Sherlock’s arms, and he reflexively cradles her against his chest, shifting awkwardly until he finds a comfortable angle. Charlotte patiently endures his novice attempt at cuddling and then wipes her saliva-laden fist across the lapel of his coat before sticking it back in her mouth. Sherlock finds himself unable to look away.”Oh. She’s...she’s so...warm. Those horrible pictures you sent did not do her justice, John.”

“Just make sure you support her neck with your--”

“Obviously,” Sherlock’s tone is distinctly at odds with his expression as he blinks down at the little girl in his arms. Mary kneels on the couch on Sherlock’s other side and leans against his shoulder, smiling at her daughter.

“This is your papa, not to be confused with your daddy. And that is his coat. It has no name but it I’m sure it’s very offended that you’re drooling all over it. Sherlock? Meet Charlotte Watson-Holmes.”

It’s a testament to Sherlock’s current state of mind that it took two entire seconds for that to sink in.

“Sorry?” he breathes, looking up at John blankly.

“Mycroft fixed it. You’re on her birth certificate and everything.” John searches Sherlock’s face wondering for a moment if Mycroft had been right, whether they had overstepped their bounds.

“Oh. Oh, that’s.That’s--that is. Yes. Jesus _Christ_.” Sherlock bites his lip to stem his babbling.  Mary slides her hands soothingly over his trembling shoulders.

“Yeah, maybe that was a lot to dump on you. Sorry. Calm down.”

“I’ve never. That is to say, I haven’t done this before and--”

“Yeah. Neither have we. I wouldn’t worry if I was you. She’s a tough little thing. If we haven’t botched it up, you certainly won’t.” John says, leaning in to meet Sherlock’s eyes. “Besides, if you mess up, Mary’ll tell you. Loudly. And repeatedly. And remind you weeks later.”

“John, you forgot to feed her _dinner_.”

“Well you missed her first doctor’s appointment.”

“Yeah, that’s because you forgot to take the afternoon off from the clinic.”

“It wasn’t on the calendar, love. How was I supposed to...oh look, she’s fussing.”

Sherlock rolls his eyes and glides to his feet, distracting Charlotte by waltzing with her halfway across the room. By the time he stops their spin, she’s gurgling and beating him with her fist.

“Yes, _ma fifille_ , they can be annoying. Fortunately,  I have returned to save you before they could do you any lasting harm.” Charlotte yawns and knuckles at her eyes. “She’s sleepy. Is it time for her to go to bed?”

“God, yes. We put her down as often as she’ll go. It’s our only down time as well. She’s sleeping upwards of three hours at a time now at least. The first few weeks were murder,” John grimaces at the memory.

Sherlock scowls. He’s missed so much.

“Damn Mycroft…The one time my sleep habits would have come in handy and I wasn’t _here_ \--” He breaks off, frowning and unconsciously holds Charlotte closer to him.

John quickly makes his way over to Sherlock and grips his arms, searching out and meeting his gaze.

“You’re here now. If you could put her to bed, It’ll give me a chance to get a shower and, well. You could. Come to bed. With us.”

Sherlock’s breath hitches and he lets his eyes drift shut as John drifts fingertips lightly over the curve of his shoulder and up his neck.

“Sherlock?”

“Yes, John?”

“You might want to take your coat off first.”

“I’ll take it off when I put her down,” Sherlock says, leaning into John’s touch. He slits an eye open. “Better make sure my sock index is in order. Should I find it _defiled_ , there will be...consequences.” John snorts out a laugh and Sherlock’s lips curve up into a pleased smirk as he watches a flush creep up John’s neck.

“Pity, we were so careful to keep all your stuff in order and now you go and say something like that. John, get the scissors. There will be no sock left whole!” Mary crows as she speeds past them towards the bathroom, relishing the fact that someone else is responsible for Charlotte. John smiles at Sherlock and follows his wife back towards the bedroom.

Sherlock lets his eyes drift shut again, listening to the sounds of the pipes hammering as the shower is turned on and the softer, almost inaudible taps that indicate that Mrs. Hudson is finishing her last cuppa for the evening.

There are changes, of course, and he catalogues them reflexively. The smell of the place has altered-- caustic/chemical/burnt toast has been largely replaced by talc/cinnamon/tea, but this change is welcome, considering the flat’s new occupant.  The furniture has been rearranged slightly as well. The chairs crowd the fireplace a little closer, making room for a small changing table next to the window. But everything else is remarkably preserved. The essence of _home_ fills a place in him that he had not previously noticed was empty.

Infantile babble interrupts his thoughts, and Charlotte yawns again, arching her back in an alarming stretch that Sherlock moves swiftly to support.

“Pandiculation. You’re quite coordinated for a child at your stage of development. We must start tracking your progress, as I’m sure your parents have neglected to--” His own words catch him off guard as Charlotte stares up at him with wide, sleepy eyes.

“Papa,” he murmurs, making his way towards the stairwell. “Will you call me that? Someday?”

Charlotte replies by way of a burble and another yawn and more damp fist waving.

“Very well _mon chou_. To bed with you,” he murmurs, heading for the stairs.

~~~

“Sherlock.”

_John’s voice sighs on the breeze, hardly louder than the soft rustle of the leaves above us. Sunlight filters green and bright through the leaves of the tree that’s him and Mary both and I know it’s a dream because the sky above is black and full of stars._

_The knowing is sweet with the knowledge that I have him here, in my mind, no matter where I go or how long I’m away and as bitter as over-brewed tea because these hands on my chest, on my stomach and thighs are the hands of a ghost...one which, even in my dream I know I’ll never touch again, and I fancy I can feel the warmth leech from the leaves of the tree, turning them coal black against the starless sky, and it’s cold, cold here but I burn inside of me for him, for their touch. The tree is hard and rough behind my back but I lean hard into it because it is them and it lowers its branches to shield and_

“Sherlock.”

_His voice is real, so very real warm breath over my frigid soul and I rock upwards toward it and feel the bitterness leak out me through my eyes, hot tears at odds with the aching need and I swear, I can feel him, I swear, pressing my shoulders, stroking my face can hear him calling my name again and I roll my hips desperate for touch and friction and his presence with me and I can feel his lips on mine, hot and insistent and am faced once again with the awful knowledge that it will never ever--_

“Oh, fuck this,”

Hang on, that’s not part of my--

Oh.

_Oh._

Without opening my eyes, reality asserts itself and the rush of recent memories freezes my lips where they’re locked with John’s. And then it comes-- Joy and relief, and desire so strong and so sudden that it almost annihilates me as it crashes through me.

John, real, present, warm, strong, _heavy_ John is straddling my lap, pressing his chest against mine and smearing away the shameful remnants of my dream with his thumbs, the rough sweep over my cheeks the most welcome sensation in the world.

“There you are.” His lips move against mine as he murmurs, we are so deliciously close, I am actually breathing his mint-scented breath and that is perfection. I want to breathe him in, I want him inside my body in as many ways possible, closer than we can ever be. I rock forward and seal my lips around his, not kissing, just pulling the air gently from his lungs and into mine. The action, small and selfish though it is, produces from him a deep, broken moan and he slides his lips against mine and licks into my mouth curling his fingers into my hair and bringing us yet closer.

The angle is wrong...our noses, our teeth and our chins all conspire to ruin the kiss but they are not up to the task-- it is heaven on earth, it is perfection.

“Jesus, John,” I breathe as he pulls back for breath.  

“You didn’t come back down so I came up to check on you and found you in a rather...compromising situation,” he says quietly.

I look down at my disheveled clothing and wonder what picture I must have painted, writhing around in the overstuffed armchair in a paroxysm of aroused desolation.

“I have never been so happily compromised in all my life,” I murmur and attempt to pull him close once more, the inches separating us are intolerable. He pulls back, putting more hated distance between us with a hand pressed flat against my chest.

“Mary--” he starts and a strange amalgam of eager, desperate excitement fires through me as I realize that they are both here in this house with me _at this exact moment_.

“Oh, my God, yes.” I cut John off and surge to my feet, somehow totally forgetting that he’s sitting right on top of me and he stumbles backwards towards the cot but I catch him and pull him back towards me before he can knock into it and disturb Charlotte’s deep sleep. We freeze, but she sleeps on, and her slumber-flushed cheek is very nearly enough to distract me. Nearly.

I dart through the door and down the stairs, hauling a laughing, happy John behind me through our flat and shoving him before me into our (our!) bedroom.

“Ah, the prodigal husband, come to bed at last,” Mary laughs. She’s lying in the center of our bed, her form hardly concealed under a sheet, curves limned in the soft light of the bedside table.

John laughs and launches himself onto the bed, onto her, and pulls her into his arms covering her face and neck in quick, light kisses. She’s wearing nothing but a black bra and knickers and the sight of John’s hands on the smooth skin of her shoulders might be the lovliest thing I have ever seen.

I dig my nails into the palms of my hands and relish the prickle of pain as proof that this is not a continuation of my dream, but indeed reality. I can’t quite bring myself to believe that this...that they are for me. That this is real. Just this morning, I was sitting in a cell, alone, going mad with boredom. How can this be real?

“Sherlock?” John blinks at me over Mary’s shoulder, and his smile slips a bit. “All right?”

I wonder how much of my thoughts reflected in my features. “Yes. Of course. Only…” I make my way to the bed and sit on the absolute edge of it, feeling unaccountably as though I am intruding, feeling...awkward.

Mary pulls away from John and drapes herself over my back, wrapping her arms around my shoulders. I reach up and lay my hand over hers where it rests above my heart.

“I think I understand, love. You’ve been alone, and bored as hell for so long. It’s been easier for us…” she murmurs and begins sliding her palms over my chest in small circles. The feeling is soothing and I can feel my shoulders slump just a bit.  “But we missed you, Sherlock. Every moment of every day we wanted you.”

I have no idea why those words are necessary, but they are. There is a... a knot of...a tightness in me that unwinds, unravels, and I succumb to relieved lassitude, leaning back against her small, warm, body and letting my head drop back to rest on her shoulder.  John presses up against Mary’s back and his hands join hers on my chest, his fingers following hers as they begin to unbutton my shirt, feathering out an aimless pattern across my pectorals as the shirt falls away.

It is bliss. Unadulterated, unbelievable bliss. There’s a tug and a shift and my bare back rests against Mary’s sternum again and her skin burns against mine pleasantly. I sigh, and turn my head, nuzzling the smooth skin of her neck, resting my lips against her pulse point while two sets of hands trace an aimless mandala over my chest and stomach.

“Sherlock,” John’s voice has deepened, roughened. It reverberates through Mary’s body and that does things to me that I can’t being to define or describe. “Come to bed with us, come with us.” A small, pleased sounding laugh somehow makes its way out of me and I toe off my shoes and allow them to lay me down on my back between them, propped up slightly against a bevy of pillows I never knew we owned. ( _Mary’s contribution, obvious_.)

John stretches out beside me, flinging a leg over my thighs and strokes his fingers through my hair and down my neck, traveling inexorably lower, and my muscles flex and tremble under his touch, and I sigh and wrap my arm around Mary, who is burrowing into my other side, and if there was nothing more than this for the rest of my life I would be content. Of this, my mind and heart are sure.

My cock, on the other hand, seems to be dissenting, especially as John’s slow stroking takes him lower and lower until he’s sliding his palm firmly over the ridge of my erection.  I take in a hissing breath at the wonderful friction and arch against him.. Maddeningly, he draws his hand back up my body until those rough, capable fingers find their way to my lips which part without my permission, but that’s fine because it means that he’ll give in and….god.

I groan low and long as he dips his fingers into my mouth, palpating my tongue with the pads of his fingers. I twirl my tongue around his fingertips, memorizing the texture and flavor and he bites his lip as Mary moans, bucking her hips up against my side as she watches John press those clever digits harder against my tongue, further into my mouth.

He tugs down, and I obligingly part my lips, opening to him and he drags his lips over mine again and again, not kissing, just, _Christ,_ just touching and sliding and he’s warm and wet and panting and I can’t get enough, I can’t feel enough of him.

Mary leans over me, her lips almost meeting John’s over my mouth as she kisses the corner of my mouth and runs tongue and teeth down my jaw and throat and chest, chasing the path of her fingertips until she latches onto my nipple, tugging softly and worrying the flesh as John continues to explore my mouth, and I thrash between them, unable to control my body or the sharp staccato cries that erupt with very breath..

“I’m sorry if we’re sort of...rushing things along,” John murmurs into my ear as Mary stretches out on my other side again, pressing herself close.

“It’s just that it’s been ages,” she murmurs. I give her a sharp look, some of the fog clearing.

“But you gave birth months ago. Barring any resultant injury, of which I assume I’d have been made aware, you would be sufficiently recovered to--’

“Shhhh, you beauty.” Mary murmurs, rolling herself onto my chest as John slides his fingers through my hair, scattering my thoughts.  I sigh and arch back into his touch.

“Christ, you’re so sensitive,” he says this in the same voice he uses to say the words ‘brilliant’ and ‘amazing.’ “We waited for you,” he adds, chuckling softly. He cants his hips forward, rubbing his erection lightly against my hip as I struggle to make sense of what he’s saying. “So. You’ll have to excuse our sense of urgency.” He hikes his leg up my thigh and nudging my own erection, almost forgotten but still so very much there.

“You waited for me?” I breathe.

“Yeah, we thought…” She, god, she actually blushes...I follow the spread of color from her breasts up the line of her throat with my fingers. It’s hypnotizing, utterly intriguing.

John saves her from her sudden fit of shyness.

“We thought we wanted to begin again as we mean to continue,” he says, meeting my eyes.

“Together, Sherlock. If that’s ok--Oof!”

Mary’s eyes widen as I snatch her against me, smashing my mouth to hers. It’s inelegant and desperate and it is not all pleasant, but I... I have no lexicon for these feelings they’re causing in me-- some bizarre cross between agony and ecstasy, and she has to know, I have to show her what I can’t say.

“Yeah, it’s probably ok, Mary,” John smirks before I hook an arm around his neck and pull him into our tangle of arms and legs and teeth and lips. He laughs. I pull back form them both and watch as John literally goes to pieces in our arms, even as he thrusts his cock against my thigh and scratches his fingers over my throat.

“What…” I’m mystified. Mary chuckles softly and nuzzles the space just behind my ear, and I arch my neck to give her better access while still staring at my inexplicably senseless...friend? lover? John. My senseless John.

“Sorry,” he gasps at last, and there are two, perfect, crystalline tears trickling down the soft valleys of laughter lines I could trace with my eyes closed. “Sorry, I. I’m just so fucking happy, I can’t help it. You mad bastard, do you even _know_?”

He tilts his face up from where he’d buried it in my shoulder and I curl towards him, smoothing away the tears on his cheeks as he did for me before and it occurs to me again how similar pleasure and pain are and how often we walk the razor’s edge between.

He looks as though he may say something else, possibly something that will cause this trembling feeling in my chest to expand, possibly something that will produce some ridiculously maudlin reaction in me that will derail the progression of events, and I decide to shut him up the only way that seems reasonable at the moment.

I run the fingers of one hand through his hair and shove my lips against his, licking into his mouth. Mary gives a cry of satisfaction from behind me and pulls at my shoulder and I roll again onto my back, pulling John’s body with me. He comes willingly, twisting so that his thigh nudges snugly between mine.

I arch into his weight, and can’t help but moan as he rocks against my cock. I toss my head back at the explosion of sensation and Mary eagerly dips low to take my mouth with hers. I slide my hands down John’s back, under his pants and cup his ass, hitching him hard against me and grinding up into him. He shifts until he’s straddling me, and bucks his hips against me. Our cocks are not perfectly aligned for this, but what friction there is chases any thoughts hilarity or indeed anything aside.

I knead my fingers into John’s ass, relishing feeling the firm flesh and muscle and he moans against my neck, and his teeth scrape none to gently over my clavicle, and I moan into Mary’s mouth and I wonder how long we can just ride this wave of intense feeling.

“Sherlock!” Mary gasps through our kiss, “Too many clothes. On you.”

“Shut up, Mary, his hands are busy--” John mumbles against my shoulder, arching his back to rub press his ass harder into my kneading hands.

“Yeah, love, but yours aren’t.”

I close my lips over Mary’s again, and what’s left of my functioning brain considers: John might argue that his hands were very much as busy as anyone’s, sliding as they are through my hair and down my chest and stomach and lower, delving into the sliver of space separating our bodies.

Just as I’m about to defend him, he slides the palm of his hand over the tip of my cock and down it’s length and we both gasp in surprise at the wetness he finds there.  

I realize that I have become so aroused that I am actually soaking my trousers in preejaculate. Apparently, what I find mortifying, John finds irresistible.

I muffle a laugh against Mary’s throat as John begins tearing at my belt and fly.

“Knew you’d get there in the end, love,” Mary’s murmur becomes a gasp as I transfer the attentions of my hands to her body, stroking over her shoulders and down, outlining the curve of her breast before urging her upwards as John drags my trousers and pants off.

She budges up, bracing herself on her elbow and I slide my lips softly down her sternum and nuzzle my cheek against the soft, firm flesh of her breasts, stroking my fingertips over the flare and ridge of her ribs before sliding down and cupping her bottom, pulling her closer to my body. She slides her fingers into my hair and cradles my head to her, murmuring things into my curls.

I twist and reach around her, slicking my fingers through the folds of her labia before swirling them softly over her clitoris.

“Oh my god, _Sherlock_ ,” she breathes and stares down at me, panting through parted lips. I slip my fingers into her and moan at the wet, tight heat of her as I press deeper inside. She bucks against me and I stroke into her, drinking in every shudder of her body against mine. The flood of wet heat in my hand makes my mouth water and I realize John is staring at us, transfixed, from where he lies draped over my now naked thighs. I’m achingly erect and he’s so, so close that I can feel the damp heat of his breath winding over my cock and I _need_.

“John, please...” my voice is a ragged, harsh version of itself. Mary moans as I curl my fingers inside of her and slides her hands soothingly down my neck, over my shoulders and chest.

“God yes...the things I want to--” John’s voice is more of a growl as he drags his body up over mine until he’s level with my chest. He slides his cheek over my skin and I gasp at the feeling of stubble over my nipples but before I can even react, he’s pressed his palm over my cock and slicked me down with pre ejaculate and he grips me, pumping lightly, riding me as I  buck up into his hand with a shout.

Mary moans against me as I withdraw my fingers, unable to focus on more than the feeling of John’s hand sliding over me.

“I want to do so much to you...there is so much we can do...so many options, I hardly know where to start,” he smirks up at Mary who has pressed her body against my side and is rocking against me in rhythm to John’s thrusts.

“There...uh. There are 45 penetrative options... _Jesus_...available to a  male-male-female oh God yes don’t--don’t stop--” I lose my voice as John slides his slick hand down between my legs and rolls my balls between his fingers while Mary clamps her lips around my nipple.

“Sounds like you put a lot of thought into this…” John murmurs kissing my ribs and licking into the hollows between them, and I struggle to create words out of my litany of moans and gasps.

“Had...god, that’s good, God, Mary your tongue...had time. To think about this...to imagine it. Better here with you, so much better.”

“With all that time to think, surely you’ve come up with a favorite?” Mary’s lips move against the ridge of my ear as she murmurs the question. My eyes slide shut and, with the benefit of Mary’s lips dragging over my throat and John’s hand sliding up and down my cock, the fantasies that sustained me in my absence make a startlingly quick and vivid appearance.

“Sherlock?” John’s breathless question and the palm of his hand sliding over my glans bring me back to myself as I arch reflexively into that delicious friction.

“God! John. Yes. Yes, I often thought--” Mary chooses this moment to appropriate my hand and begin licking slowly up my fingers and I find my thoughts scattered before I can finish my sentence.

“Tell us.” John says, removing his hand from my cock. I get the distinct impression he won't continue until I comply. Surely I didn’t just _whine_. 

“I want to be in you,” I say, nuzzling against Mary and pausing just long enough to see the momentary flash of disappointment contort John’s features. That will teach him to deny me. “And I want you in me,” I murmur, reaching for him, because even I realize there is a time and a place for that kind of game and neither is now or here.

“Oh,” Mary breathes, stilling beside me.

“Logistically, I’m not sure how reasonable--”

“God, you.. _reasonable_? Just you. Jesus. Just you watch, Sherlock Holmes. Get up here.” Mary grins over me at John.

“Just watch? I rather think I need to be an active participant in--ah.”

My breath is knocked momentarily from my lungs as Mary throws herself onto my body, covering every inch she can with her small frame. The press of her skin on mine is heaven and I wrap my arms around her and smear my lips down the curve of her neck. She thrusts her pelvis against mine and wiggles down and we both gasp as my cock slides between her thighs, slicking quickly as it rubs past her vulva again and again, and I simply cannot believe how wet she is, how her body responds to my caresses.

Not just my caresses, I realize abruptly as she cries out softly. John has straddled our thighs and is running his hands over Mary’s body, sliding over her back and neck and into her hair as he presses her gently but inexorably into me. I feel a fresh wash of moisture anoint my cock at his subtle show of control and she writhes against me.

John slides a hand between her thighs and presses my cock more firmly against her labia, mercilessly teasing both of us. I catch up her arms and draw them up next to my head, clasping her wrists lightly in my hand above my head, stretching her out on top of me and skating my fingers down the length of her spine and back up again.

“Christ, yes, God,” her words melt into stream of bitten off moans as John curves over us, bracing himself with his hands on my shoulders, pressing his body down onto her, sliding his cock between the cleft of her ass.

He catches my eyes, his expression fierce enough to make my breath hitch, and slowly and deliberately lowers his lips to the nape of Mary’s neck. He laves her skin with the flat of his tongue and then his eyes slide shut, his lip curls and he bites. She gasps with me and we moan together as her hips buck against mine, as her thighs tighten around my cock and I sigh as she goes boneless between us as he nips at her skin, his eyes once again boring into mine even as he clamps his hands hard down onto my shoulders.

He ruts against her, pressing her harder down onto me. I slide my hand down between their bodies and catch the head of John’s cock against the heel of my palm as he ruts against Mary and bite my lip as I realize how slick he’s become just from his own pre ejaculate. He growls and shoves roughly forward again and Mary moans and smears a line of kisses down my clavicle.

“Fuck, I want-- Christ, I want you inside me, Sherlock, please….please,” she murmurs, her hips hitching between our bodies.

My eyes fly to John’s and he grins down at us before kneeling back and bringing Mary with him. I feel momentarily bereft with without their heat and weight bearing down on me, but the sight of her on her knees, arched back against his flushed body does much to replace that lost heat and I scramble to my knees and press against her body, sliding my cheek against her thighs and the softness of her belly and breasts as she curls her fingers into my hair and sighs, turning her head where it rests against Johns shoulder to plant an open mouthed kiss at the base of his throat.

Gently, he turns her and lays her down beside us. She grins up at me, beautifully flushed and her hair curls madly around her face. My fingers itch to card through it, but John distracts me by sliding his hands slowly over my chest and neck before chasing his touch with his lips and his tongue.

I shiver and turn to him finding his lips with mine and moaning against them when he rocks into me. I slide my hands up his throat and cup his jaw, sliding the pads of my thumbs through the soft, sparse day old stubble. His eyes slip shut and he relaxes into me, sliding his arms around my waist and splaying his hands over the small of my back.

I rock against him, drawing him closer, deepening our kiss and sliding my tongue into the wet heat of his mouth. He shuffles forwards on his knees, pressing us together from chest to thighs. I can feel his pulse through his cock pressed against mine between our bodies and I let my head drop back as I focus on this unbelievably intimate sensation. Vaguely, I hear Mary moving behind me. John moans into my mouth and slides a hand between us.

“John, yes yes yes,” the word explodes on every breath as he wraps his fingers around our cocks. He breaks the seal of our lips, tugs my head to his shoulder and I curl against him, breathing deeply through an unaccustomed tightness in my chest as he strokes our cocks with one hand and drifts the fingers of the other over my shoulders and back.

I melt, relaxing against his sturdy body, giving over my body into his care, trusting him to guide me, as ever. There is warmth...John’s flushed hot skin against mine…I’ve often observed that he runs hotter than I do, and suddenly, it’s not only the front of my body thats warmed.

Mary presses herself against my back, and I can feel her lips drifting over the puckered skin on my shoulders as a beautiful, petite hand paws at my hip, petting and smoothing over my arse. I moan and flex the muscles under that lovely hand, pushing my hips against John.

“Sherlock,” she murmurs, her hot, moist breath pools over the skin between my shoulder blades. “Sherlock, I’m going to--”

I thrust my arse back against her, moaning my eagerness into John’s shoulder. She hisses a breath, slides well lubed fingers down the cleft of my ass while pressing me against John’s body with a firm palm between my shoulder blades. John pulls me firmly against him, his arm iron around my waist as he thrusts his tongue between my lips again and pulls another long, slow stroke between us.

Mary twitches the tip of a finger against my anus and I breathe harsh and desperate into John’s mouth, my body unable to decide whether I should buck backwards to impale myself upon her finger or forwards to fuck against John’s cock in his fist.

It’s almost a relief as she presses into me, the end of expectation and the beginning of adjustment. John strokes us lightly and quickly, and shimmering, effervescent pleasure sublimates any discomfort into bliss.

“Oh Sherlock, you beauty, look at you,” Mary says, and I know she’s biting her lip against that wry, appreciative smile I love so much. I arch into John, flexing the muscles along my back and smile against his shoulder at her gasp.

“Peacock,” he murmurs a smile gracing his own lips before he tucks his head in and applies them to my throat. He does not kiss, but sucks and licks, his tongue and lips working the flesh of my neck with the same cadence and intensity as his hand working our cocks and I gasp and writhe against him, almost senseless with pleasure.

“Oh yes, yes, you gorgeous man, you absolute angel.” Her voice is low, made husky with unrequited desire. I reach behind me, groping blindly as John adds teeth to the mix of tongue and lips and slide my fingers into the slick heat between her legs. Her gasps add to the general cacophony of pleasure and she rubs against my hand. The angle is awkward but the sensation of her wet, velvety skin sliding over my palm is intoxicating.

I realize I’m shaking at approximately the same time that I realize that Mary has slipped a second finger into me. John holds me against him, crooning something unintelligible in to my skin as I fall apart, going boneless and heavy as Mary twists her fingers inside me, stroking steadily. Pleasure suffuses every breath, every beat of my heart, pooling in my core until I’m gasping with it, groaning and pleading and shaking with it.

“John, love, I think he’s ready. I know I am,”

“Christ, yes… Please. God please…” I can’t stop this flow of words, this litany of desire as Mary slides her fingers from me and lays back against the pillows, spreading her thighs in an invitation that is quite the most erotic thing I have ever seen. John strokes us one more, a long, hard pull that rips a groan from my throat and turns me, until I’m kneeling between her thighs, knees apart. I bend over her, dipping low to drag my chest against her body, and brace myself with elbows on either side of her, arching my back and canting my hips upwards in an invitation of my own.

“Jesus, fuck,” John mutters and I feel him behind me, his thighs pressing against the back of mine. Mary reaches down between our bodies and lightly grasps my cock, positioning me at her entrance, slicking my glans against her entrance. John clamps a hand onto my hip, holding me back from reflectively thrusting into her.

“No, wait, Sherlock, just…I want…” I know what he wants and I arch back towards him, dropping my forehead to Mary’s breast as I feel him push his slicked cock against my anus. I shout, shaking as he pushes carefully into me. His hands anchor my hips, drawing me gently but inexorably back against him until my arse is flush with his pelvis. The burning stretch quickly transmutes to a warm, pleasant ache as my body adjusts around him. 

Mary stares at us with pleading eyes and I moan against her skin as I pump my hips shallowly, brushing my glans over her entrance, straining forward against John's firm grip.  John rocks experimentally into me, small gentle movements that make me gasp and ache for more.

"Please, John, I'm--God I'm fine, it's good, just. Fuck,  _please,"_ I moan, pushing myself hard against him to prove the point.

He grunts softly in pleasure and draws himself almost out of my body before plunging back in. He pushes down hard on my hips and with that smooth movement thrusts me into Mary. She arches as I enter her, and I go deep, gasping as John presses harder into me. I can feel the flex of his cock, and the fullness and tightness and hot, wet heat that engulfs me. I muffle my scream against her skin and freeze, utterly overwhelmed by sensation.

“Fuck, Sherlock, Jesus Christ…” Mary gasps and undulates under me, tiny thrusts all she can manage, but even that movement threatens to push me over the bright edge and I wrap an arm around her waist, crushing her to me to still her until I can be sure I can make this last.

An excruciating eternity later, thirty seconds at least, John begins to rock into me in gentle, small movements that in turn thrust me into Mary, who is half beside herself with need.

It’s beyond anything I have imagined, this connection, this absolute intimacy. I can’t stand it, and I understand suddenly that I’ll never be able to live without it, never survive its lack.

Mary wraps her arms around my shoulders and clings to me as John begins to thrust in earnest, and after a few  moments we find a sublime rhythm, a perfect feedback loop of pleasure. John leans over me, sliding his hands over my skin before gripping my hips to steady my body as he increases his tempo. Light lances behind my closed eyelids as he brushes my prostate each time he penetrates me and I feel myself coming completely unravelled.

“Fuck,” Mary whispers against me, “Oh God, oh fucking _Christ_ …” I can feel her clenching around me and I piston into into her, breaking contact with John in order to give her what she’s begging for, her need written clearly on every straining line of her body. I watch raptly as she bows beneath me, tossing her head back and crying out in a ragged, wordless expression of ecstasy as she comes hard around me.

The sight of her, the feel of her tightening around me and the sound of John’s moan as he watches us bring me to the brink of orgasm again and I thrust back against him, sliding from Mary’s body as she goes slack beneath me. John grabs at my hips, uttering a hoarse shout as he enters me.

The angle is perfect, the head of his cock slides directly over the sparking bundle of nerves inside of me and I scream again as I shatter utterly, blinded and deafened by the intensity of the orgasm that rips through me, extended almost past the point of endurance by the feeling of John’s cock pumping and twitching inside me as he spills into me.

My joints abruptly give out and I only just manage not to crush Mary under me as I fall gracelessly to my side, whimpering as John leaves my body abruptly but unable to do anything about it but breathe and tremble and press my face against Mary’s shoulder.

John collapses beside me, not close enough to touch my oversensitized skin, but close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him and as we lay there, I can see why they call it an afterglow. Everything seems to shine with an aura of soft light and I wonder at this phenomenon until I realize I’m asleep.

By which point I’m waking again, obviously. I must have only drifted for a few minutes because the sweat kicked up by our efforts has only cooled on my skin, not evaporated. I wonder what roused me when the sound comes again, a fretful, bleating little noise issuing from the baby monitor propped up on the bedside table.

John’s hand clamps down on my waist just as I tense to spring from the bed and Mary turns towards me, cracking a lazy eye open.

“Give it a second, Sherlock, she’ll probably just fall back asleep,” she murmurs, fishing around blindly for the sheet that has long ago fallen off the side of the bed.

“But shouldn’t--”

“Nope,” John mutters, pulling me against him and curling his body around mine. His skin sticks uncomfortably against my back. “Not yet, just wait a moment.”

There’s another sound of discontent followed by what can only be a sigh of disgust and then silence falls and the only sound is that of our steady breathing.

My skin prickles along my back where John lays against me and I slide my thighs together, disliking the feeling of drying come immensely. Knowing I’ll never be able to sleep like this, or even lay peacefully awake without bothering them, I twist out of John’s grip, kissing his lips lightly as he moans in protest.

I regard myself in the mirror in the loo while I wait for the water to warm and have to smile at my reflection. My hair is an absolute wreck and I have a line of dark bruises trailing down my neck and over my chest. I turn and regard my back, noting the crescent shaped indentations where Mary dug her fingernails into my skin as she thrashed through her orgasm. The thought makes my cock twitch and so help me, a soft laugh escapes my lips. I decide that I need to get back to them as quickly as possible. A full shower will have to wait until morning.

I make do with a damp flannel, then collect two more. John has gravitated  toward Mary, has curled around her in a tight knot. I slide onto the bed behind him and pull on his shoulder. He reluctantly releases her and rolls towards me.

“Needy git,” he mutters and I grin down at him before swiping the flannel across his stomach and thighs. His eyes pop open in shock and I tighten my grip on the flannel as he tries to grab it.

“No, John, let me…” I can’t explain why I feel the need to do this. There’s an extraordinary intimacy in touching him this way outside of the context of intercourse and, after a moment, he relaxes into it, letting his eyes drift closed as I clean him as best I can.

I glance up and meet Mary’s gaze, hooded through half closed eyes. With minimal fumbling I cross over John and pull her into my arms. She murmurs something against my shoulder that sounds like thanks or love as I gently wipe down her breasts and belly and thighs. I toss the flannels towards the door and reach over Mary to pull the duvet up from where it’s fallen to the floor and sweep it over us before pulling them towards me.

Mary rests her head on my shoulder and John winds his entire body around my left side and sighs, already asleep.

Sleep does not come for me. It’s hardly a surprise, but what is surprising, shocking even, is that after months of inactivity and boredom, I do not feel the restless need to be up and moving about.

There are, of course, experiments I’ve been contemplating and Lestrade has already texted with a request for consultation, but despite the potential of a case, I find myself completely content to lie still, trying to isolate the separate rhythms of their hearts beating against various parts of my anatomy.

Was a time I would have considered this type of inactivity a waste of life. If all the trials we have weathered have done nothing more than realign those skewed priorities, it was all worth it, but of course there is so much more than that.

Every good thing in my life is the result of evil thwarted. Without an Afghani sniper, I’d never have met John. Lacking Moriarty, John would not have met Mary. Even Magnussen had been a catalyst in his own way, forcing me to confront the depth of my feelings for John’s remarkable wife and even giving me the chance to prove to them how much I would sacrifice for them, though admittedly, we all could have done without that.

As I watch the harsh street light lancing through the curtains give way to softer dawn I feel the prickle of excitement, a familiar surge of adrenaline. Yesterday I was in a cage, today I am free. It is a new beginning in every single sense of the word, and I can not wait to begin. Fortunately for me, Charlotte is not as unforgivably somnolent as her parents. She wakes just as it becomes physically impossible for me to remain quiet for another second and I feel absolutely giddy that I have someone with which to share my early morning exuberance. I leap from my bed, and John cracks a sleepy eye open and grins at me.

“Nappy, formula, playtime, in that order.” he mumbles before rolling over onto Mary. I lean over and brush my lips against his temple, smiling as Charlotte lets us all know in no uncertain terms how badly she’s being neglected.

“Obviously.”

~fin.


	52. New Work!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote another story in this universe

Hi everyone! I wrote a new story in this universe and since so many people requested it, I wanted to make sure that everyone who subscribed would see it. It's a slightly late christmas story you can find [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3065855%22). Hope everyone had a great holiday season!


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